The Paradox of Love, Time and Death
by MyLittleViolet
Summary: "I don't like her." Those were the first words Anna had said since Mikoto's death... SaruMi, OCs, Warnings inside
1. Crow meets Girl

**So, I've recently become addicted to the anime K and really felt like writing story about it. Now I must say that I have that bad habit of always adding OCs to my stories. I know that some people hate them, but I think you should give them a chance. Just don't say I didn't warn you. I don't intend to pair them with any of the main characters...not so far at least. The main pairing will be SaruxMisaki, simply because they're pure awesomeness.**

**Warnings: bad language, dark themes, violence, original characters, yaoi and smut (most of them in the later chapters; and I can say that it's very likely that the rating will change to M later)**

**Disclaimer: K belongs to GoHands, I only own my OCs which are Valentina and some other idiots**

* * *

_Crow meets Girl_

* * *

"Yeah, yeah. I just left the airport. Man, that was an exhausting flight! I had this stupid mother sitting right beside me, who had a screaming competition with her baby. I couldn't get to sleep at all!" Valentina complained loudly into her cellphone.

"_Aw, my poor sweetheart. How did you manage not to kill her?"_ Blaise asked on the other end of the line.

Valentina sighed. "Seriously, I don't know."

"_And what are you going to do now?"_

"First I'm going to have a smoke and than I'll see how I get to my new apartment." Valentina said.

"_You're ruining your health, you know."_

Valentina rolled her eyes. "Yeah, I know, I know. But you should know best just how bad I am at self-restriction."

She heard Blaise laugh. _"Yeah, how could I forget?"_

"I'll call you again, when I've settled."

"_Fine, and don't forget to call your parents. I'm sure they're dying to hear from you."_

"Yeah, yeah, I will. Bye!"

"_Bye, Val!"_

Valentina hung up on her best friend and stuffed her phone back into her purse. She took a moment to search for her pack of pink cigarettes and her lighter.

She'd just enlightened one of her cigarettes when a boy on a skateboard passed by her. Normally she wouldn't pay much attention to these kinds of kids but this one caught her eye. Mainly because red flames enveloped his whole body.

"You'll pay for this!" he screamed loudly in Japanese. She couldn't make out who it was he was screaming at.

Valentina blinked after him. None of the other passersby took a second look at the boy on the skateboard. Was she imagining things?

"And no fucks where given that day..." She said to herself.

* * *

"All those fights with HOMRA are becoming a real bother." Awashima Seri complained. "Two of our men where attacked this afternoon near the airport."

Munakata sighed. "It can't be helped. You surely can remember to what extends they went to avenge Totsuka-san's death. Now I killed their king. This was to be expected."

"Suoh-san would've died one way or another. We could all see his Sword of Damocles falling down. If you hadn't killed him, the sword would've killed him. They should know that it was a mercy kill!"

"Yes, but it is much more simple to deal with grieve if you have someone to blame for it. All we can do at the moment is keep the situation from escalating." Munakata said.

"Yes, of course."

* * *

Valentina let herself fall down on her new bed. What an exhausting day! But still, she couldn't help but grin like an idiot. She finally made it! She was in Japan! She'd dreamed of this day for so long. She went to evening classes to learn Japanese for years and now she'd finally here. And by the end of the year, she intended to take the Japanese Language Proficiency Test.

After she'd relaxed for a few more moments on her bed, she got up again, lightened another cigarette and grabbed the phone to call her parents.

She hesitated for a few seconds before she put the phone away again. She didn't feel like talking to them. In the end, she decided to write them an e-mail later.

Valentina walked over to her bedroom window and leaned outside. She blew the smoke of her cigarette up into the night sky.

"I'm not quite sure why, but I feel like this is going to be the best year of my life." she said to herself.

* * *

Valentina had nearly forgotten about the boy with the red flames, until she met him again the next day.

She was on her way to do some purchases when she heard his voice from a backstreet. She immediately recognized it and of course decided to take a peek.

The boy was in flames again and facing a young man in a blue uniform. To her amazement the man in the uniform wielded a sword, a saber. It was unsheathed and some kind of blue flashes surrounded it.

"You Blues think you're the greatest now that Mikoto-san is gone, right?! Well, I'll show you, you damn…" The boy screamed at the man. "Do you think you can take over this city now that you killed the Red King off?"

The man kept calm. Well, he had a sword and it would be kind of concerning if he would loose he temper easily. But then again, why did he wield a sword in public at all…? That was already concerning enough.

"That was never our Captain's intention and you know that, Yata-san." He said calmly.

"Liar!"

The boy, Yata, charged in the man's direction.

Valentina's mouth dropped open. Was he out of his mind? The blue guy hand a motherfucking sword! He couldn't possibly fight a sword with a skateboard!

But, to her immense amazement, he could. He moved so fast, her eyes couldn't quite follow him. His skateboard flew around in the air and blocked the others sword thrusts, almost as if strings pulled it. And somehow the boy always managed to land safely back on it, never losing his balance even once.

In the end he knocked the Blue out with a hard blow against his larynx. The man fell over with a gasp.

Yata laughed and put his foot on the man's chest. "You damn Blues! It's time that someone put's you in your place!"

The man beneath him was still gasping for air and the fact that Yata pushed his foot hard down on his chest didn't help at all.

Valentina clapped her hands together and exclaimed, "_Sugoi_!"

The boy whirled around and starred at her with wide eyes, his face suddenly turned dark red.

"That was really amazing! I've never seen something like this before!" she said in Japanese and hoped she'd made no mistakes.

"Ehm…eh…I…ehm…" The boy stuttered.

Valentina frowned. Had she spoken so unclear? She decided that it would be best to first introduce herself.

"My name is Calabrese Valentina." She made a slight bow. "It's nice to meet you."

"Eh…I'm Yata Misaki…i-it's nice to meet you too." He said hesitantly.

He seemed to be really unsure. Was she talking so badly? Maybe he had trouble understanding her? She'd always exceeded when it came to learning a new language, which was why she planned to become an interpreter, and she was actually rather confident in her Japanese skills. She couldn't quiet believe that she was _that_ bad. Maybe it wasn't the language, maybe it was because she'd just witnessed how he beat somebody up and thought she would call the cops or something…

"I saw what you just did and I must say that was really amazing! I hadn't thought you would have a chance. I mean, that guy has a sword but you totally owned him with nothing more than a skateboard! And what were those red flames all around you? That looked so cool!"

"Y-you mean my aura?"

She crooked her head. "Is that what you call it? How did you get it? And how did that guy get that blue Aura?"

"I-I am a member of the red clan HOMRA, therefore my Aura is red. That guy is a member of the blue clan Scepter 4." Yata said.

"I see, so all clan members can use the Aura?" Valentina asked.

Yata nodded.

Valentina thought about it for a moment. Being able to wield that kind of power would come quite handy for her.

"And how does one become a clan member? Could I join you?"

Yata hesitated. "Well…The king decides that, but Mikoto-san died and…it's no place for girls anyway. It's dangerous."

Valentina frowned. Yata had just implied that she was weak and she hated being called weak. She kind of wanted to stomp her foot and scream "I can fight too!" but that would look really stupid and childish. Instead she asked, "Haven't you chosen a new king yet?"

"No! We don't choose a king. The potential to become a king runs in ones blood. Either you're fated to become a king or you're not. At the moment, we wait for our new king to show up." Yata explained passionately. "A king is the most powerful of all. Only another king can match with a king."

Valentina stared at him with big eyes. "That sounds amazing." She said, making sure to sound really impressed. She wanted to find out more about that boy's power.

The boy grinned at her. "Well, I can't let you in our clan but maybe you would like to meet our other clan members." He seemed to realize what he'd just said and stuttered. "B-but only if you want to…"

She smiled at him. "I would love to."

* * *

The bartender Kusanagi Izumo blew out the smoke of his cigarette with a sigh. His fellow clan members were fighting again. Those fights occurred more and more frequently since Mikoto's death. The person who'd brought and held them together was gone now and HOMRA was slowly falling apart. It was a sad thing to watch. He'd given up trying to stop them from fighting, the only times when he still intervened were when they threatened to harm his beloved bar.

He threw a quick glance at Anna. The young strain hadn't said one word since Mikoto's death. Now, she was only sitting there, gazing into space. Her face expressionless as always. He could feel how she suffered but there was nothing he could to for her. Mikoto was gone and no one could bring him back. HOMRA would never again be what it was before, not with how things were now. Not without a king.

The day when Mikoto had died and all the HOMRA members had shouted "No blood! No bone! No ash!" together up into the sky, Izumo had thought that there was hope. That they would still hold together. TBut Mikoto's loss had simply been too big. Izumo had realized that HOMRA couldn't function without the right leader.

The front door to his bar opened and Yata stepped inside…together with a girl.

Immediately everyone inside the bar fell silent. Yata's fear of women was well known among the members of HOMRA and everyone was certain that the boy would stay a virgin for the rest of his life. Seeing him with a girl was quite a shock for most of the members.

Izumo took a closer look at the girl. She was obviously a foreigner but also quite a beauty. She looked to be around 20 years old, was slender and a few centimeters taller than Yata. Her long dark ash blond hair was in a hime-cut style and she had a nice cream-colored skin tone. She wore a pink blazer over a frilly black dress and pink high-heels. Not the kind of girl you would expect to see inside this bar. On the other hand Anna was also not the kind of girl you would expect to see here.

"Yata-chan, who's that?" Izumo asked.

Yata blushed immediately. "Eeh, ehm, t-this is…"

The girl interrupted him. "Calabrese Valentina. It's nice to meet you all." She said cheerfully.

"Welcome to HOMRA. My name is Chitose Yō." Chitose put his arm around the girl and pulled her away from Yata. "What is a sweet girl like you doing with someone like Yatagarasu? Can I call you Valentina-chan? Or Tina-chan?"

The girl laughed and said. "I don't mind the chan but please don't shorten my name."

"Oi, Chitose! Keep your filthy hands off her, you damn womanizer!" Yata screamed at him.

Chitose snorted. "A fine lady like Tina-chan needs a gentleman to look after her. Not some rude brat like you."

"Brat?! Come here and I will mob the floor with your face Chitose!" Yata screamed.

"Come on, Yata-san. Izumo won't be happy if you start a fight inside his bar…"

"Let go of me, Kamamoto! I want to see if the womanizer can still get any girls with a broken nose!" Yata screamed at an overweight blond boy who tried to hold him back.

Valentina had already managed to get out of Chitose's grip and put some space between her and the squabblers.

"If you idiots want to fight, please take it outside." Izumo said firmly.

"Whatever!" Yata grunted and dragged Kamamoto and Chitose both out of the door with him. He seemed to be a lot stronger than he looked.

The other clan members followed them immediately, not wanting to miss a good fight. That left Izumo, Anna and Valentina alone in the bar.

Izumo took another drag of his cigarette before he said. "My name is Kusanagi Izumo and this is Kushina Anna. Welcome to HOMRA. Would you like something to drink?"

Valentina smile and sat down on the bar stool beside Anna. "I would like an Vodka Red Bull. And can I borrow your lighter?"

Izumo raised an eyebrow at the pink cigarettes she pulled out of her purse. "That depends, are you already older than twenty?"

She smiled at him. "Sure."

"So, how did Yata-chan manage to get you here?" he asked her after she'd lightened her cigarette.

Valentina shrugged. "I saw him beating up a guy from Scepter 4 and approached him. My interest was drawn when he told me about the Auras and the kings and therefore I asked whether I could join HOMRA. Sadly, he said no. But he agreed to bring me here to meet you guys."

Izumo frowned. She saw someone beating another person up and the first thing she thinks about is wanting to join that person? Normal people would have been scared. Maybe run away or call the police. What a strange girl…

"And so still want to join HOMRA after seeing what a bunch of ruffians we are?"

The girl chuckled. "Yeah, you seem to be a lot of fun."

"That's quite reckless." He said.

Valentina took a gulp of her Vodka Red Bull. "Oh, I know how to protect myself. I'm doing Muay Thai and I went to several self defense courses. I'm stronger than I look."

Fine, so she wasn't completely helpless but Izumo kind of doubted that she could protect herself in a fight against someone with actual color power.

"Your name sounds Italian, are you from Italy?" he asked to learn a bit more about the girl.

"No, I'm from England but my father has Italian roots." She said.

"So what are you doing here in Japan?"

"Oh, I'm visiting Shizume City's language school to improve my Japanese. I want to take the Japanese Language Proficiency Test this year."

"I don't think you need to visit that school. Your Japanese is quite flawless even if one can still hear your accent." Izumo said. "I don't think you will have any problem with that test. But what do you want to do afterwards?"

Valentina gave him a big smile. "Thanks! Well, I want to become an interpreter. I know, I don't need that test for that but I've wanted to come here to Japan for a long time now. My parents still think it's a waste of time but I was somehow able to convince them to let me come here."

She emptied her class with another gulp and got up from her stool. "I'm going to see how the guys are doing outside."

Izumo looked after her as she left the bar. "What do you make out of that girl, Anna?" he asked without expecting an answer.

"I don't like her." The young strain said quietly.

Izumo looked at her in surprise. Those were the first words Anna had said since Mikoto's death...

* * *

Far away from HOMRA, on the other end of Shizume City, one could find one of the major tourists attractions of Shizume City: a vast complex of greenhouses called _The Eden Greenhouses of Shizume_. One of those greenhouses, one of the few that wasn't open for visitors, served as headquarter for the Green Clan, EDEN.

"Ma-chan, Yu-chan. Welcome back."

The young green king sat on an elegant white garden chair and held a steaming china teacup in his hand. He only shot a quick uninterested glance at the twins who knelt in front of him.

"Why did you call us, Hikaru-sama?" The boy asked.

"Did you see something?" The girl asked.

The young king smiled. "You guessed right, Yu-chan. I saw something indeed. The tea leafs told me that a new player entered the game."

"A new player?" The twins asked in unison.

Hikaru chuckled. "Yes, yes. The silver and the red clan are without kings, the golden king is retreating himself more and more, and the red and the blue king are at war. With that new player entering the game I think it's time for us to act."

The twins looked up at him.

"This might be our chance to take control over the city. The golden and the blue king have ruled long enough." The girl said determined.

"Careful, Yu-chan, the black clan is probably thinking the same thing. Anyway, it's not Shizume City or power that I want. All I want is Munakata…dead." Hikaru said. "Go now and keep your eyes on HOMRA and Scepter 4. If you see anything unusual, contact me right away."

"Of course, Hikaru-sama." The twins said before receding.

* * *

**I hope you enjoyed this chapter :) pls R & R**


	2. Monkey meets Girl

**Hey hey, so here is the second chapter. I was a busy girl and made it as fast as I could^^ I already have a pretty good idea where the story is heading and I hope I can keep my writing speed up, it's going pretty smooth at the moment ;)**

**Disclaimer: yeah, like always: I don't own K**

* * *

_Monkey meets Girl_

* * *

One week had passed since Valentina started to visit HOMRA frequently every evening. She got along pretty well with most of the members. A few of them were still trying a few stupid pick-up lines on her but she didn't really mind. Her biggest problem was actually to find a way to get along with Yata. She was still unable to figure him out. She'd heard of some of the clan members that Yata had an irrational fear of women. But there were times when he talked completely normally to her and then there were times when he started to stutter like an idiot. She'd found out that the best way to get him talk to her was by making him forget that she was a girl. Up 'til now the most successful topics to archive that were video games, music and skateboarding.

That day she'd decided to try something new.

"Yaaataaaa!" she called out when she entered the bar. "You have to go to the cinema with me tonight! I won't except a no!"

"Can we come too, Tina-chan?" some of the other members asked.

Valentina cringed. She hated it when other people shortened her name. The only people who were aloud to do that was Blaise and her brother. And they shortened it Val, not Tina. Back in school she'd always beaten up everyone you called her Tina, regardless of whether they were male or female. It'd earned her more than one appointment in the principal's office. But for now she'd decided that it was a bad idea to beat the people up she wanted to befriend with...and they probably could beat her up to if they all had the same power as Yata.

"No." she grunted and dragged Yata out of the bar.

"So…what do you want to watch?" Yata asked hesitantly as he walked beside her.

Valentina shrugged. "Don't know. You can choose, I don't really care."

He fell silent after that.

"So what have you been doing all day?" she asked instead.

"Well, I have this part-time job…and I've tried some new skateboard tricks." He said hesitantly.

"Ah, yeah, I think I should get a part-time job too. Back at home there was this diner where I always jobbed as a waitress and I had a coworker named Julie, who was a real bitch. We fought like all the time, but now I kind of miss her. Maybe I should tell Blaise to give her my regards…" Valentina said.

"Who's Blaise?" Yata asked.

"Oh, just my best friend. I met him in my Japanese evening classes. He's kind of weird and I think also quite crazy but he's cool. He's like the only person who managed to be my friend for longer than a year. I think I should ask him to come over as soon as he has some free time..."

Yata suddenly stopped in his tracks. Valentina stopped talking and turned around to see him angrily staring to the other side of the street. She followed his gaze and saw three men in blue uniforms. She recognized the uniform immediately, the man Yata had beaten up one week early had worn the same. She concluded that it was the uniform of Scepter 4, the ones who killed the last red king.

"What is that damn monkey doing here?" Yata growled.

"What?" Valentina asked. _What monkey?_

"You see the one with the blue hair and the glasses? That's Fushimi Saruhiko. He was once a member of HOMRA but he betrayed us and joined Scepter 4 instead. Only seeing his stupid face already pisses me off!" Yata clenched his fists and Valentina knew that he wanted to do nothing more than run over the street and kick that guy's guts.

She grinned. "Do you want to see him humiliated?"

He glanced at her. "Yeah but how? No matter what I do, I never can whip that guy's arrogant smile off of his face."

"Please, I have a master's degree in humiliating other people, just leave it to me."

* * *

Fushimi clicked his tongue. "This is so pointless."

"Orders are orders, Fushimi-san. You don't want to oppose the lieutenant, do you?" Enomoto said.

"Yeah…that woman can be really scary…" Dōmyōji said.

Fushimi rolled his eyes "Those damn red idiots. I can't believe I have to work overtime because they think it's a good idea to randomly throw the city into turmoil just because their stupid king died. Fucking retards." he grunted.

"Yeah, one wonders whether they have nothing better to do… poor Kamo got a bad beat up last week. The doctor said that he was lucky that his larynx didn't break. And it's not like Kamo-san got anything to do with their king's death." Dōmyōji complained.

Fushimi gritted his teeth. He didn't like to be remembered about that incident. Not because he felt sorry for his fellow clansmen - seriously, he couldn't care less - but because of what Kamo had told them about the incident. He'd said that the one who'd attacked him was Yata Misaki…in the company of an unknown woman. The woman hadn't engaged into the fight but she'd cheered at Misaki afterwards. Fushimi didn't like the sound of that at all. Since when did Misaki have any female friends? Well, besides Anna but the strain didn't count since she was still a child. The thought of some woman fussing around Misaki pissed him off.

"Looks like our day is just about to get better!" Dōmyōji exclaimed suddenly. "A pretty girl is coming our way!"

Fushimi groaned and looked another way. The last thing he wanted to deal with was some persistent woman. He'd never liked the presence of women, he felt like they were born for the sole purpose to annoy him. He hoped Dōmyōji and Enomoto would take care of her.

Since he wasn't looking the sudden blow took him completely by surprise. And it was a hard blow for a woman. She hit her fist right into his face.

"YOU DAMN PIECE OF SHIT! I CAN'T BELIEVE I FELL FOR YOU! MY SISTER TOLD ME EVERYTHING, YOU DIRTY SHITBAG! I CAN'T BELIEVE YOU SLEPT WITH HER AND MY MOTHER TOO, YOU DAMN MOTHERFUCKER! AND I MEAN MOTHERFUCKER LITERALLY!" the girl screamed.

Everyone, and really everyone, turned around and stared at them.

Fushimi was so taken by surprise that he was speechless for once. He barley had the chance to think _"What the fuck?"_ before he felt an overwhelming pain in his lower abdomen. He collapsed with a breathless gasp down on the asphalt. The bitch had fucking kicked him in the groin!

"DO YOU'RE DIRTY S&M GAMES WITH SOME OTHER SLUT! I HOPE YOU BURN IN HELL!" The girl screamed before stomping away.

Fushimi, still on the ground and holding his with pain pulsating groin, looked up to see where she was going (so, he could chase after her and kill her as soon as he was able to walk again) and saw no one else but Misaki on the other side of the street – laughing his ass off. He gave the girl a thumps-up and said something to her before they walked away.

Fushimi felt suddenly a strong wave of anger filling up his entire body. It looked like he found the bitch who dared to beguile Misaki. Those two where lucky he wasn't able to stand up at the moment or he would've murdered them right in the middle of the street.

He turned to his fellow clansmen and screamed at them. "Hurry up and help me up!"

Dōmyōji and Enomoto looked at him with pale faces and giant eyes.

"WHAT'S UP WITH THAT LOOK? I SAID: HELP ME UP, YOU BRAIN DEAD IDIOTS!" he screamed at them and they immediately hurried to help him.

Fushimi swore to himself that he would make the bitch regret this day for the rest of her life.

* * *

"That stupid monkey's face was priceless! I wish I had filmed it so I could watch it again and again anytime I need a good laugh." Yata laughed when they walked out of the movie.

Yata had been talking to her nearly nonstop since the incident without one single stutter. Even during the movie which had earned them quite some angry glares. And all this time he been talking about about nothing else but that guy called Fushimi. Looked like the topic Fushimi Saruhiko worked even better than video games, skateboarding or music to get him to talk. She found it quite interesting what strong emotions that guy could trigger inside Yata. She figured that finding out more about him could probably prove as useful. Yata's ranting about how much of an asshole he was, was however everything but useful.

"Anyway, how did you like the movie?" Valentina asked. She didn't want to listen to Yata's ranting any longer and tried to change the topic.

Yata shrugged. "It was fine I guess. There could have been more action and I didn't like the ending."

"Yeah, you're right. I didn't like the maincharakter, I wish the bad guys had beaten him up a bit more." Valentina agreed. Happy that he finally stopped having a monologue about Fushimi.

"And what's up with all those women? Why does every man in an action movie need at least two halfnaked women drooling over him?" he complained.

Valentina chuckled. "Well, because that's what most men want to see."

"Not me. I want to see some good fights. Those women are just annoying." Yata complained.

"You're not a big fan of women, are you?"

Valentina could see Yata's face turn deep red as he realized that he was talking to a member of the female species.

"I…I didn't mean…you're not…I mean…" he stammered. Ah, and there was the stuttering again.

Seeing him so helpless and flustered made her laugh. "Don't worry about it. Just talk to me like to everyone else in HOMRA."

She had to admit that he was kind of adorable and he really wanted to make him comfortable around her.

She took his hand and dragged him after her. "Come on, let's get something to eat. I'm starving."

* * *

Yata yawned. It had been a quite exhausting day, but since he didn't need to get up early tomorrow he decided to go back to HOMRA before he headed home. If he'd known what awaited him there, he'd gone home right away.

All the faces turned in his direction as soon as he entered the bar.

Izumo was the first to speak. "How was your date, Yata-chan?"

Yata looked at him puzzled. "What date?"

"Aw, don't play dumb! He means your date with Tina-chan." Kamamoto said.

"What? That wasn't a date! We just watched a movie and afterwards we ate something together. That's all."

"Ehmm, Yata, that's a date." Chitose informed him.

"_Eeeeeeh_? But I've went dozens of times with Kamamoto to the cinema and I sure as hell never dated him!" Yata exclaimed.

"But Tina-chan is a girl. It's different with a girl. And she didn't want us to come along, so I would say she's interested in you." Kamamoto said.

"Yeah, why else would ask if she could join HOMRA and come here so often? She barley knows anyone of us." Chitose said.

The blood drained from Yata's face. What they said kind of made sense…

"_Eeeeeeeeeeeh?!"_

"Maybe you should ask her though… We could be wrong. The mind of a woman is a very complicated thing." Izumo said. "You shouldn't…" He stopped when Yata ran screaming out of the bar.

Everyone stared after the boy.

"…Panic right away." Izumo finished his sentence.

"Man, the guy really is a hopeless case…" Kamamoto said.

"Yeah…and I thought it had gotten better since he met Tina-chan." Akagi said. "He's going to really stay a virgin forever if he starts to run away every time a girl shows a little interest in him."

Chitose sighed. "Maybe we shouldn't have said anything…"

Everyone nodded.

* * *

**Yeah, so I hope you liked my second chapter^^ The next one will be up as soon as possible, but I wont make any promises since school is really stressing me out at the moment.**

**I kind of feel bad for hurting Saru but my sadistic side really enjoyed writing it...sorry Saru...  
**

**See you next week^^**


	3. Black Coffee

**Hello everyone^^ Thanks soooo much for all your lovely review :D  
**

**To Deaths Lie: Well, I like to believe that a girl can become a king (or rather a queen) too, but that's just my opinion. It probably won't happen in the anime since (as far as I know) gender equality is not quite up to date yet in Japan. To Valentina's role...nah, I won't tell :P**

**So, this chapter is a bit shorter but I promise that the next one will be quite a bit longer ;) I hope you like it ^^**

**Disclaimer: well, it's the same as always...I think I won't put it in this story anymore, I said it often enough.**

* * *

_Black Coffee_

* * *

Fushimi stared angrily at the monitoring screens inside Scepter 4's main control room. He was on surveillance duty. Normally he would prefer this kind of work to patrolling though Shizume City. He just needed to sit there and watch over the screens and nobody would bother him.

Normally, but not today. Today, his body was fuming with rage and he wanted to do nothing more than run through the city until he found that damn girl. He'd tried to do some researches about her but it was no good since he didn't even know her name.

The more time passed, the more he felt the urge to make somebody suffer for his frustration. The fact that he could hear his fellow clansmen talking behind his back didn't help his situation much.

_"Have you heard about Fushimi-san?"_

_"Yeah, apparently he raped some girl."_

_"Raped? I heard he cheated on her with her mother."_

_"And her sister."_

_"Yeah and she beat him up in the middle of the street."_

_"Really? Fushimi-san was beat up by a girl?"_

_"Yeah, Dōmyōji-san and Enomoto-san both saw it."_

_"I always thought that Fushimi-san was asexual…"_

_"I heard that she was underage and that he has some kind of Lolita-complex."_

_"I heard she said something about him having some really sick fetishes."_

_"What fetishes?"_

_"I don't know..."_

_"I heard he had orgy with her and a bunch of whores."_

_"Ew, great now I have that picture in my head!"_

_"Yeah, I can't believe he's such a pervert…"_

_"To rape an underage girl at an orgy…he should be put to prison!"_

_"Shhh! Not so loud! He's sitting only a few tables away."_

_"I always knew that something was wrong with that guy. He's such a psycho."_

Fushimi's patience snapped. "SHUT THE FUCK UP!"

The other Scepter 4 members flinched in their seats. The room was immediately death silent.

Fushimi massaged his temples in annoyance and turned his attention back to the monitors. He'd already explained the incident to the captain. He had no need to justify himself before the other clansmen too. They could think whatever they wanted as long as they stopped annoying him.

Fushimi was suddenly snapped out of his thoughts when he saw a flash of ash blond on one of the monitors.

He took a closer look but the woman was already gone. The monitor showed a part of the shopping district in Shizume city. Fushimi's hands flew over the keyboard and a few seconds later he was able to observe the whole shopping district from every angle possible. It only took Fushimi a few moments to find the girl again. Long straight ash-colored hair and a frilly pink dress. She was just entering a manga store and disappeared from his sight again. Fushimi had only been able to see her back but he was pretty sure that it was the same girl.

He pondered shortly whether he should go there right now or keep following her with the cameras. He knew he could be there in 10 minutes, maybe earlier if he ran fast enough, but she might already be gone by then.

In the end he decided to take the risk and go after her. Mainly because the other clansmen had started to talk again and he knew he would murder them all if he had to listen to them for much longer.

Fushimi got up from his seat and called out to them, "If the captain or the lieutenant asks for me: I'm off the check something out."

He didn't wait for their answer.

* * *

Fushimi had been lucky. The girl was still inside the store when he arrived. She was currently looking around the BL section of the store. This gave Fushimi some time to catch his breath. He decided to wait until she left and then follow her. It wouldn't be too smart to murder or attack her in public.

Luckily it didn't take her very long. She left without buying anything. He counted to ten until he followed her out of the store. She was already a little more than ten meters ahead of him. Occasionally she would stop to look at some shop windows but she she never entered anywhere. He was happy she didn't run from dress shop to dress shop, like he knew women tended to do. He hoped that she was on her way home, that way he could find out her address. But in the end she walked inside a small café.

Fushimi stopped outside the café and peered inside through the windows. She had a window seat and was just ordering something.

Fushimi wondered whether he should go inside too. The café seemed to be pretty small, she would probably see and recognize him if he walked inside. On the other hand, he didn't knew how long she intended to stay in there and he really didn't feel like just waiting outside like an idiot.

In the end, she took the decision away from him. After the waitress had left her table, the girl turned her head and looked right at him – with a smile. She raised her hand and motioned him to come to her.

Fushimi frowned and hesitated for a moment but he decided that he could as well go in. He was busted anyway.

With a sigh he walked inside the café and over to her table, hoping she wouldn't start screaming again. But she only sat there and smiled calmly at him. He raised an eyebrow at her. Her eyes seemed to penetrate him. They were so incredibly light blue it looked creepy.

"Fushimi-san, please have a seat." She said softly.

He sat down on the opposite side of the table.

"Ah, I'm so jealous…" she laughed.

Fushimi was confused. "About what?"

"Your eyebrows. You can raise only one eyebrow. I always wanted to be able to do that but I only can raise both of them at the same time." She complained.

She tried to raise one eyebrow while holding the other one down, which didn't quite work out.

Fushimi frowned. What a strange girl... "What do you want?"

She let go of her eyebrows and grinned at him. "I should be the one asking that. After all, you stalked me. Not the other way around."

The waitress arrived at their table and put a latte macchiato and a cup of coffee down before them.

"There you go." She said before disappearing again.

Fushimi looked down at the cup before him. The coffee was black and three packets of sugar lay on the saucer but no milk. He frowned again. Fushimi preferred his coffee black and sweet but this girl couldn't possibly know that…could she?

"Would you mind to tell me your name?" Fushimi asked.

"Of course not. It's Calabrese Valentina. There is no need for you to be formal, just call me by my first name." she said.

Fushimi poured all three packets of sugar in his coffee and stirred it with his coffee spoon.

"So, what do you want from?" she asked while scooping some of the milk froth and licking it off of her spoon.

"The question is not what I want from you, but what I want to do with you." He said with an evil grin.

She chuckled, obviously not taking his treat serious. "If that's the case, go one an try your luck."

Fushimi scowled at her. He really hated it when people didn't take him seriously. He wanted to retort something, but at that moment his smartphone rang.

"Moshi-moshi, Fushimi de gozaimasu."

"_Fushimi-san, this is Awashima. We have an emergency situation. I've already sent you the location. Come there right away!"_

"I'm on my way." He said before hanging up again.

Valentina tilted her head. "Leaving so soon?"

Fushimi emptied his coffee in one gulp and got up from his seat.

"I'm looking forward to meet you again, Fushimi-san!" she called after him.

Fushimi rolled his eyes. He was beginning to dislike her more and more. Well, at least he had her name now. It won't be hard to find out where she lives now.

* * *

The lieutenant was already waiting for Fushimi when he arrived at the location that she had send him. It was a small building on the outskirts of Shizume City. And a large crowd of reporters and onlookers had already gathered around the cordon.

"...We can't say much more at this point. A press conference will be held at Scepter 4's headquarters this evening. We'll be able to tell you more then." He heard lieutenant Awashima Seri say to the reporters.

She saw him struggling through the crowd held up the police line so he could easier slip underneath it.

"Please excuse me now." She said to the reporters and led Fushimi out of earshot from the reporters. A few police officers had to make sure non of them would pass the cordon.

"What happened?" Fushimi asked finally.

Awashima had a sour look on her face. "Some burglars tried to break into this house. They found…" She motioned in the direction of the front door. "Well, you better look for yourself."

Fushimi frowned and stepped past his lieutenant. If burglars had called the police, then it must be pretty bad... The moment they stepped through the door and into the house, the most disgusting stench hit his olfactory organ. Fushimi cursed and held his nose.

He'd already seen a lot since he'd joined Scepter 4 and he certainly wasn't someone with a weak stomach but at the scene that stretched before him even he got a queasy feeling.

* * *

**Yeah, so that's it for today... **

**Sorry that Misaki wasn't in this chapter...he will be in the next one for sure :)**


	4. Dead Bodies

**Hey hey again^^ First off: You might already have noticed, I changed the rating from T to M. Why? I'm not quite sure what is still suitable for 13 year olds in terms of blood, gore and so on... I know that I read much worse things at that age, but I also know that I'm not quite normal. So I wanted to be on the safe side and changed it. (I would have have to change it for the next chapter anyway^^)**

**That being cleared, I wanted to thank you for your amazing reviews again^^**

**To Deaths Lie: Na, I would never kill off my sweet Misaki. Don't worry, the main cast is safe with me^^ and it gives me pride to answer reviews ;P**

**To Maya095: Thanks a lot! I kind of have the tendency to write loud and mean female OC's and sweet and cheerful male OC's, dunno why...**

* * *

_Dead Bodies_

* * *

Two dead bodies lay the floor before Fushimi. An unbearable stench of putrefaction hit him. The corpses seemed to be already in an advanced sage of decay. The color of their skins had taken on a strange dark violet to black marbling and it appeared kind of wet. On top of that, there were strange marks on the skin. Larvae had started to eat the skin on the victims heads and were crawling in and out of the eye sockets, the nose and the mouth. Blowflies covered nearly the whole bodies and had now also started to sit down on Fushimi's skin. There was nothing on this earth that Fushimi hated more than insects. As a kid, he once couldn't sleep inside his room for days because he'd seen a spider and hadn't been able to catch it. By now, he'd been able to get his aversion towards insects mostly under control but this situation was still a bit too much for him.

He stepped quickly back out off the house gasped for fresh air. He frantically tried to get the flies off of his skin. This definitely made it on the first place of the most disturbing things he'd experienced in his life! Right before that auto-cannibalistic strain he'd once seen and that wet dream he once had about his captain*.

Fushimi tried to suppress the nausea that was rising up in him and took a deep breath before he asked, "Just those two? Or are there more?"

He looked at his lieutenant, whose face was also quite a bit paler than usual.

"We're no quite sure yet, but we assume that there are around twenty corpses inside. We haven't been in the cellar or the attic yet. Some of them are fresher, some are older. Whoever did this, was doing it over a longer period of time. We're probably dealing with a serial killer." She answered.

Fushimi took a few more deep breathes before finally regaining usual indifferent persona. He hated the fact that he'd actually lost his composure for a moment, especially in front of his lieutenant.

"What about the owner of the house?" he asked.

Awashima shook her head. "We have no idea where he is right now. But he was already known to the police, he'd spend 10 years in prison for rape and was released two years ago. The police hasn't heard anything from him since then. The possibility is high that he's among the victims inside the house, but we won't know for sure yet."

Fushimi nodded. "Since they called us here, I assume that there is some sort of strain-involvement?"

"Well, there hasn't been a serial killer here in Shizume City for ages and the police is therefore a bit overcharged. They are also quiet suspicious about the strange marks on the victims bodies. It might be a strain, but we don't know yet." Awashima answered.

Fushimi frowned. If they were in fact dealing with a serial killing strain, then they really had a problem. Nothing was worse than crazy strains.

"Oh and there is something else you should know. All the victims, except one, were female and at least from the newer corpses we could tell that they seemed to be in their late teens and early twenties." Awashima added.

Fushimi nodded. "I see, that means the killer is probably a man who gains sexual satisfaction from making women suffer."

"That could fit to the owner of the house. He was convicted for rape after all, maybe that wasn't enough for him anymore." Awashima said. "On the other hand, he might also be the one male victim we found."

Fushimi shrugged. "I want to attend the autopsies. When do they start?"

"The first ones are this afternoon. We want to identify the victims as soon as possible."

"Good, you should make a public notice and tell the people to report if one of their daughters or sisters went missing in the past." Fushimi said.

Awashima sighed. "I know. The reporters are already waiting to tear me apart with questions. We will say everything at the press conference this evening."

Fushimi nodded and turned back towards the house. "I will take another look inside."

Awashima frowned. "Are you sure you want to do that to yourself? The forensic scientists will take care of everything."

Fushimi nodded. "Yeah, I want to make sure that I didn't miss something."

He took a deep breath and stepped back inside the house. If it weren't for the insects it would only be half as bad. Man, he really hated insects. They were worse than the stench.

* * *

Not far away stood a young girl watching the two Scepter 4 officers. Her name was Tsukino Yurina and she wore a dark green wa lolita dress with a yellow flower pattern, her pitch-black hair was pulled back into two pigtails and she fanned herself with a green fan that had the same flower pattern.

A smile crossed over her dark red lips.

"A crazy strain, eh?"

She chuckled.

"I wonder if this is the new player Hikaru-sama was talking about…"

* * *

Yata let himself fall down on the lush green grass. He'd spend most of the day trying out some new skateboarding tricks in the park and was pretty exhausted now. Skateboarding always had and always will be his favorite pastime. Not only gave it him every time a nice adrenalin kick but it also helped him to get his mind cleared. When he skateboarded he was able to think about nothing else and forget the whole world around him.

He closed his eyes and turned his face towards the warm sun.

Valentina came back to his mind. He had to admit that he'd grown to like the girl during the short week since he met her. And she was very pretty too. He'd never spend so much time with a pretty girl like her. But he simply couldn't imagine her to be his girlfriend. Only thinking about getting that close to her freaked him out. You couldn't understand why other men liked to do those kinds of things with girls.

Yata let out a sigh. It had always been the same with him and girls. He never felt comfortable around a girl as soon as he thought of her as a possible girlfriend. He was fine around Anna, since she was still a child, or around his stepsister but that was about it. He often wondered what was wrong with him. He thought that women were lovely and pretty creatures…as long as they stayed far away from him. And as long as they kept their clothes on.

Now, he wasn't sure if he could face Valentina again. Was she really interested in him? What should he do now? He couldn't be her boyfriend! There was no way he could do something like kissing her! Yuck! Let alone…well you know. Double yuck! But he couldn't reject her either. He had absolutely no idea how to reject a girl. And he didn't want to hurt her.

"Ahhh! Why has this to be so complicated!" he screamed out.

Yata turned onto his stomach and started to pick some grass blades.

He knew that he wouldn't be able to talk to her when he met her again. Yes, he was that pathetic. Beating up a whole yakuza gang on his own was no problem for him, but make him talk to a pretty girl and he would wet himself from fear.

"Why can't all the girls be boys too?" he murmured and rested his head down on his folded arms.

He was really exhausted and his eyelids started to feel really heavy. He would just close them for a minute...

* * *

_Yata's old TV was buzzing. A handsome young man was reading the news._

"_Today the corpse of a young woman was washed up here in Shizume City. The police says that she hasn't been dead for long before she was found. The wounds on her body are an indicative of a violent crime. The women went missing over one year ago in England. Her name was…"_

* * *

Yata felt someone poking his cheek. He'd fallen asleep. He stretched himself with a yawn and opened his eyes to see who poked him.

The sun was reflecting on ash blond hair.

* * *

Fushimi stared down at the dead woman before him. She was lying naked on the cold dissection table before him. She must have been very beautiful once. Now her eye's stared emptily into nothingness and her body was disfigured. She kind of looked like a broken mannequin to him. Both her arms and legs were broken and twisted in unnatural directions. Large parts of her skin were for some unknown reason necrotized and words in a foreign language were burned into her pallid skin. On her back, in the middle between her shoulder blades, was the shape of a raven tattooed in angry black lines on her skin.

"Any idea what the raven means?" Fushimi asked.

Awashima shook her head. "I'm not quite sure… But all the victims have the same tattoo. It might have some symbolic meaning. Ravens have very different meanings in different cultures, but they are commonly associated with bringing bad omens, tidings of death, sorrow, and destruction. That could be one explanation. But it's also possible that that tattoo simply has some personal meaning for the killer."

Fushimi nodded. "What about the words?"

Awashima shrugged. "The language is Latin, but I wasn't able to translate them yet."

"Well, I can help you with that." The pathologist, a snobbish looking man with sleek bleached blond hair, suggested. His name was Kitamura Naoji.

He pointed at the words on her left arm. "This reads '_Hinc mihi fletus abundat_.' which means '_Hence my tears are abundant_'."

Then he pointed at the words on her right arm. "_'Hinc fletus inundat._', '_Hence my tears are flowing'_."

"And the words on her stomach read '_Est mihi pallor in ore. Est, quia fallor amore._', which means '_My face is pale. Because of love's disappointment_.' It's a poem about unrequited love. I think I've heard it before." He concluded.

Fushimi frowned. "Unrequited love?"

Awashima looked at him. "You have any idea what that could mean?"

He shrugged. "Well, I can only speculate but I think that our killer was rejected by a woman with a raven tattoo on her back which caused him a great psychological trauma. He probably killed her in his rage and is now reproducing her death over and over again."

Awashima nodded. "That makes sense."

"Anything else?" Fushimi asked the pathologist.

"She wasn't dead very long before she was found, certainly not longer than a day. There were barley any insects on her and the rigor mortis is only a few hours past his maximum stiffness. I think she'd been dead for 12-15 hours. According to the livor mortis, she died on her back. You said you found her lying on her stomach? That means she was moved before the rigor mortis set in, meaning between 20 minutes and 3 hours after her death.

"The marks on her ankles and wrists suggest that she was restricted for a longer period of time. There was some blood under her fingernail but the marks on her palms suggest that she draw the blood herself, so no luck there. Her arms and legs are all broken multiple times, probably in order to make her suffer. But apart from that, none of her external injuries were fatal. Her skin is necrotized on different places, but I'm not sure why. I only can poisoning or burning exclude as causes. Might be the caused by a hypoperfusion of the skin. I suggest we move on to the internal examination." Kitamura said before he turned to the diener, a smaller man with light brown hair. "Watanabe-san, please place the body block now and start to get the brain out for me? I will cut the torso open in the meantime."

The diener nodded and placed the body block so underneath the corpse that the head was elevated and the chest was stretched and pushed upwards a little. Once the body block was placed, the diener proceeded to make an incision from behind one ear, over the crown of the head, to a point behind the other ear. While he pulled the scalp away from the skull and over the corpses face, covering her dead eyes, Kitamura had started to cut her torso open. The pathologist made a deep incision that extended from the neck all the way down to the pubic bone, making a deviation to the left side of the navel.

Meanwhile Watanabe had started to cut the skull with a Stryker saw open.

Kitamura exposed the ribcage and took a pair of rip shears to cut through the ribs on the lateral sides of the chest cavity. When he was finished he lifted the sternum and the attached ribs as one chest plate out and set them beside. A bit of blood had started to pool down on the dissection tabled. It left angry red lines as it ran down the dead woman's pale skin.

Watanabe lifted the brain out of the skull and handed it to Kitamura. The pathologist put the brain down and started to examine in.

Only a few seconds later the blond said. "I think I just found the cause of death."

Fushimi raised and eyebrow and he and Awashima stepped closer.

Kitamura pointed with his scalpel at one area of the brain. "You see that dark stain? She had a large cerebral hemorrhage. This is without doubt the cause of death."

Fushimi frowned. "A bleeding inside her brain? That's not quite what I had expected."

"Well, maybe he hit her really hard on the head." Awashima suggested.

"Yes, a head trauma would be the most likely cause. However, I didn't see any injuries on her head before…" Kitamura said.

Fushimi shrugged. "Let's continue the autopsy. We'll draw a conclusion after we examined a few more of the victims."

Kitamura nodded and placed the brain in a container filled with formalin.

Watanabe had in the meantime filled the now empty skull with cotton wool, placed the top of the skull back on his place, pulled the scalp over the skull and sewed it back in place. He then proceeded to take the other organs out of the torso and handed them to Kitamura for examination. The pathologist would examine them shortly, cut a few bits out of them, placing them in several bowls with formaldehyde solution before handing the organs back to Watanabe who thew them back inside the torso. Just standard procedure, nothing interesting.

That was until Kitamura examined the dead woman's uterus.

"I found remains of sperm here." He said.

Awashima stepped closer. "So the killer raped her?"

Kitamura shook his head. "No, there are no signs of a rape. The sexual intercourse was consensual."

"That might be just a coincidence. Maybe she had a date right before our killer got her." Fushimi said.

Awashima nodded. "We will have to wait for the other autopsies. But an DNA test on the sperm might help us find out the victims identity."

Fushimi sighed. "I think we've seen now everything that was of importance. When will be the next autopsy?"

Awashima looked at her clock. "In about an hour. Munakata-san will attend to that one too."

Fushimi nodded. "I'll be there."

* * *

Yata jolted up.

"Va-va-val…" he stuttered, desperately trying to get her name out.

What should he say now? He wasn't ready for this yet!

Valentina tilted her head. "What's the matter, Yata-san?"

"I…ehm…y-you…no!" he stuttered.

She frowned at him. "What do you want to say? Why are you so nervous now?"

"I-i-izumo s-said that y-you…w-we…d-d-d-date."

Her face lightened up. "Ah, I understand! He said to you that our trip to the cinema was a date and that freaked you out."

Yata nodded.

Valentina chuckled. "There is no need for you to worry. I don't think that way about you. I already have somebody I like."

Yata let out a long breath. "Thank god!"

"How funny. You're the first boy I met who freaks out about something like this so much. Why are you so afraid of women?" She asked.

Yata felt his cheeks heating up. "W-well, I just feel weird getting so close to woman and I feel uncomfortable when I think about it…b-but I also don't want to disappoint or hurt them…I feel like I can not meet their expectations…"

Valentina blinked. "I see…so you feel uncomfortable when you think about getting close to women… Say, Yata-kun, what do you think about when you masturbate?"

Yata needed a few seconds until he understood what she'd just said.

"Wwwwwwaaaaa?!"

He immediately moved away from her. His face felt like it was burning up from embarrassment. How could she say something like that so shamelessly?

"Yes, do you rather think about girls or boys?" she continued.

"W-w-w-what are you saying?! I-I-I don't…" he stammered.

"Aw, come on, you can't tell me you don't masturbate. Every boy masturbates. It's very normal."

He put his hands over his ears. "I don't hear you! I don't hear anything! Lalalalala!"

Yata felt like he was dying from embarrassment.

At that, Valentina sighed before she tackled and started to tickle him. Yata was someone who was very ticklish. He immediately burst out into loud laughter and tried to push her off.

He had to pull all his willpower together not to kick her or hurt her otherwise. When she finally let go of him, he collapsed completely breathless down on the grass.

Valentina laughed and lay down beside him.

"You don't have to always get so embarrassed. There is absolutely no need for you to be ashamed. Believe me I've been in many embarrassing situations and this is none. You know, I once dated my math teacher's son. And one time I stayed overnight at his place because his parents weren't at home. So, since they weren't at home I didn't bother to put some clothes on when I wanted to grab something to drink out of the fridge the next morning and of course they came back home that very moment. Before I even understood what happened, my math teacher stood before me and I was completely naked. And that's by far not the worst story I have up my sleeve." She told him.

"God, I would have died..."

"Yeah, do you want me to tell you about that one time my father caught me in bed with a boy and a…"

"I don't really want to know." He interrupted her quickly. Hearing so private things about her life made him flustered. He wondered how she could talk about those thinks without feeling embarrassed. Sometimes he wished he could be more shameless.

Valentina chuckled. "Well, I thought that if I tell you about my embarrassing experiences you would feel better about yourself."

"Did you have a lot of…you-know-what?" he asked hesitantly.

"Sex?" Valentina asked and Yata blushed immediately at the word.

She shrugged. "Well, I had a bit of a reputation at home…but I don't think that I really lived up to it. But I wasn't an angel either. I liked to experiment a bit and most of the other girls couldn't stand me so they made me out a lot worse than I actually was. I was never able to get along with girls. I mostly hang out with guys, but Blaise is the only one I would call my friend."

She turned her head in his direction and smiled. "I would like to call you my friend now too."

Yata stared back at her for a few minutes before he nodded.

Valentina's smile widened. "You know, I'm really happy I met you."

* * *

Yata had escorted Valentina home later. All the while they talked about pretty random thinks, he told her about some new skateboard-tricks he'd tried out and they made plans to go to a concert of some band Yata liked. Valentina didn't fail to notice that he was talking much freer to her now. Maybe he'd finally gotten over his fear of women...or at least over his fear of her.

As soon as she was home, she turned on the TV and prepared a nice bath. Her apartment wasn't very big, actually it was rather small, but it had it's perks. For example, one could watch TV while lying in the bathtub if one let the door to the bathroom open.

She listened to the news as she let herself relax in the steaming hot water. The newscaster was babbling something about a serial killer in Shizume City.

Valentina turned her head towards the TV. A serial killer? That could be interesting.

"_…currently the special police force Scepter 4 is taking charge of the case. We will now switch to Domen Mayumi-san who is now live at the press conference with Munakata Reisei, head of Scepter 4._" The newscaster said.

A young woman with a microphone in her hand appeared on the screen.

"_Domen-san, can you tell us more about the incident?_"

"W_ell, yes. Munakata-san just informed us that all the victims, except one were female._" The young women said before she turned to the blue haired man beside her. "_What else can you tell us?_"

The young man gave her a friendly smile before he answered. "_Well, the killer is targeting attractive women between the age of 16 and 25 years. We found remains of sperm in each of the victims we've examined so far but no signs of rape. We weren't able to properly examine the sperm yet but we're pretty sure that it belongs to the murderer. That lets us conclude that the killer is an attractive, or at least very charming, man who seduces his victims and sleeps with them before he starts to torture them. We want to warn everyone, especially young women, not to go out alone and not to trust any strangers._

"_We would also appropriate it if you could report any girls, that went missing during the last year, directly here at Scepter 4. Please bring pictures. It could help us identifying the victims._

"_Also, the killer tattooed a raven on all the victims backs. If you have information to it, please also report right here."_

Valentina's eye's widened.

"_We have here a sketch of the tattoo_." Munakata added and the camera adjusted to the sketch.

Valentina jumped out of the bathtub, nearly causing her to slip, and darted towards the TV.

"How is this possible?!" she screamed at the screen.

"Y_ou said that there was one male victim?_" the reporter asked.

Munakata nodded. "_Yes, the owner of the house where the corpses were found. Other than the female victims, he wasn't tortured. The killer simply shot him in the head._"

The reporter asked something else but Valentina wasn't listening anymore. She jumped into a pair of shorts and pulled quickly a T-shirt over her head before she darted out of the house.

She ran the whole way to Scepter 4.

* * *

**Thanks for reading^^ I hope I didn't bore you to much with the autopsy and all...but I felt it was important. I just feel like I'm lacking a bit in SaruMi moments, so there will be for sure on in the next chapter. As soon as the investigation is rolling I will try to focus a bit more on them. I'll upload the next chapter on Saturday or Sunday.  
**

*** If anyone is interested in that wet dream...just check my one-shot _Heat_ out^^**

**Here a few explanations to more specific words (if it interests you):**

**Livor mortis: Latin: _vor_—"bluish color," _mortis_—"of death"; blood that settles down in the lower parts of the body after the death, it causes the skin to turn purplish red**

**Rigor mortis: Latin: _rigor_ "stiffness", _mortis_ "of death"; the limbs of the corpse become stiff and difficult to move or manipulate**

**Diener: German for servant, in English it's used for the person who's responsible for handling, moving, and cleaning the corpse (often performed by an Anatomical Pathology Technologist)**

**Body block: hard to explain... here is a picture of one: web2*.iadfw.*net/uthman/autop_table.*jpg (you need to remove the *)  
**

**Stryker saw: special saw used during autopsies, here's a picture of one: web2*.iadfw.*net/uthman/autop_tools*_*pix/stryker_ saw*.jpg (here too)  
**


	5. Sweet Dreams

**Yay, so here is the promised chapter^^ I hope you'll like it. I should warn you that there is a bit of smut in it but it's only a little bit and it's harmless^^ And as always: thanks for every review and fav and whatever :D**

* * *

_Sweet dreams_

* * *

Yata sat in his room right above of the bar HOMRA. The whole building belonged to Izumo and he rented the rooms above the bar very cheaply to the members who couldn't afford any other apartment or needed to safe some money. Since every room had it's own small bathroom, Yata figured that the building had once been used as a motel or something like that. The furnishing in his was pretty spartan. A bed and a closet had already been there when he'd moved in. The only things he'd added were an old TV and an xBox with a bunch of games, as well as a mini-fridge and a microwave. He'd put some posters up on the walls and his floor was covered with his old clothes and some manga-magazines.

Right now, the vanguard of HOMRA was sitting on his unmade bed and slurped some instant ramen.

On the TV ran some commercials.

"…_the newest album Broken Blood as well as the single Love me Dead of the famous band Vermillion is now finally available!"_ a few snippets from the music video followed.

Yata grinned. That was great. Vermillion was actually one of his favorite bands and the lead vocalist Kurokawa Yuji was quiet hot. He was slender and tall and had a simply marvelous body. On top of that, Yata really liked his burgundy red hair. And he had those really big black eyes that could make anyone…wait a minute!

"Why the hell am I ogling some other guy?!" Yata screamed to himself. "Gaaaa! That's just because Valentina said those weird things before! I don't like boys! Girls are much better! Girls are delicate and graceful!"

He threw the empty ramencup beside and sighed. Yes, girls were delicate and graceful but he couldn't remember ever thinking of a girl as more than that. He never really had a crush on a girl before. That wasn't normal, was it?

He tried to remember any girls from his High School but was unable to recall any names or faces. Back in High School his thoughts had always turned around Saruhiko. No matter how much Yata hated to admit it, the damn monkey had been the first really good thing that had happened to him. Without him, Yata probably wouldn't have made it through High School.

Yata let his head fall back on his pillow and closed his eyes. He remembered the time when they'd joined HOMRA. So many bad things had happened before that and Yata had been sure that their lives would finally turn for the better. HOMRA had given them a new home, a new family…and then Saru just left.

"Stupid monkey…why did you leave me?" Yata mumbled to himself.

His chest tightened painfully. To be honest, he missed Saru. The Saru he knew during his schooldays, not the sadistic asshole he was now. Or had he always been that sadistic asshole and Yata had simply never realized it?

Yata chuckled and turned onto his stomach. "Yeah, that would be more like it…"

He closed his eyes and slowly drifted off to sleep.

* * *

Fushimi yawned and stretched himself. It was already pretty late and it had been a long day. His legs hurt from all the standing during the autopsies and there were still more to come tomorrow. He hoped that the victims could be identified quickly so that he could start with the geographic profile of the murderer. Maybe they could even identify the killer with the sperm…that would certainly be very helpful.

Fushimi massaged his temples. This case was already giving him a headache.

All the victims died from a major bleeding inside their brain…that couldn't be a coincidence. But how did the killer do that? After the third autopsy, Kitamura said that he was pretty sure that the bleedings weren't caused by a head trauma. Did that mean that the killer really was a strain? A strain who could make blood vessels inside your brain burst? That didn't sound good at all.

On top of that, there were these strange necroses on the victim's skins. Kitamura had said that they were probably cause by a hypoperfusion of the skin. By now, Fushimi was wondering if they were dealing with a strain that could manipulate the blood flow. He'd never heard of something like that before but it wasn't impossible.

Fushimi's stomach was growling. He sighed. He hadn't eaten anything all day expect that coffee Valentina had payed for him.

Fushimi froze. Valentina! He'd completely forgotten about her.

He immediately started his computer. How could he have forgotten about the woman who was creeping around his Misaki?

He was drumming his fingers on the table while he waited for his computer to finally get started. He thought about Misaki and wondered what he was doing at the moment. He hadn't had the chance to talk to HOMRA's vanguard since Mikoto's death and he hadn't seen him all day today. Fushimi was more than irritated. First that annoying woman and now a serial killer... He wanted to do nothing more than go back to their high school days when it had only been him and Misaki without all those annoying people around them.

As soon as his computer was ready, he started a search engine and tipped the name Valentina Calabrese in.

Fushimi's mouth dropped open when he saw the first results.

"How on earth is this possible?"

* * *

_Misaki and Saruhiko were lying on Saruhiko's old bed in his old room. They were both facing each other. Saru looked younger, his hair was neater than it was now and combed down straight. His fringe fell into his dark blue eyes. The smile on his lips was a soft and lovingly one, not the mocking one he wore nowadays._

_He looked so breathtakingly beautiful that it hurt._

_Misaki smiled back at him. "I really missed you." He whispered softy._

"_Me too." Was Saru's answer before he shifted closer._

_Misaki felt a shudder running down his body when he felt Saru's soft lips on his. He wrapped his arms around his best friend and pulled him as close as possible. He ran his fingers through Saru's soft hair. God, he'd always loved Saru's hair. When they finally parted they were both panting. Saru's cheeks were flushed and his eyes looked lustfully at him. Misaki could feel Saru's fast heartbeat._

_Misaki put his leg around Saru's hips before he pulled their lips together again. He felt Saru's leg moving between his, pushing up against his groin. Misaki moaned softly against Saru's lips and moved his hips against Saru's body, desperate for more friction._

"_I want you, Misaki." He heard Saru say huskily between kisses._

_Misaki groaned and leaned his head back, granting Saru access to his neck._

"_I'm all yours…"_

* * *

Yata woke up with a gasp.

He was lying on his stomach and he could clearly feel his erection pushing against mattress of his bed. He quickly sat up and looked around. He was still inside his room. The light was on and the TV still running. He'd fallen asleep in his clothes.

He grabbed the remote and turned the TV off.

His cheeks felt like they were burning up from embarrassment. What on earth was he dreaming? How could he have that kind of a dream with the stupid monkey of all people? That guy was an arrogant and sadistic maniac! …A very good looking maniac…but still a maniac! And a guy!

He should be having these kind of dreams about girls, not other boys!

"God, what the hell is wrong with me?"

* * *

Fushimi stepped out of his office when he heard loud voices in the hallway.

"What the hell is going on?"

"This girl here barged in and demanded to see the captain. She wanted to disrupt the press conference." One of his subordinates explained. "She became violent and attacked us when we refused to let her pass."

The girl whose arm he was holding was no one else but Valentina. Just why couldn't that girl leave him in peace for once?

Fushimi also noted that one of his subordinates had a bleeding nose and another one was holding his stomach.

"You better have a good explanation for this." He said to the girl.

"I need to talk to Munakata-san! It's important! And now tell your brain dead friends here to let me go!" she hissed angrily at him.

Fushimi raised an eyebrow. "Oh? And what is so important?"

Valentina cast a meaningful look at his subordinates and Fushimi sighed.

"I'll take care of her. Go!" he said to them before pulling her inside his office.

"So what do you want?" he asked her. "Or are you just here to make my life a little harder."

She crossed her arms. "Of course not. Believe me, you're not that important to me. I'm here because of that serial killer you guys talked about in the news."

"What about him?" Fushimi asked.

"I have some information that might interest you, but I'll only talk to Munakata-san!"

"Maybe I should inform you that I'm the one who's leading the investigation against that serial killer." He said.

Valentina frowned at him. "Maybe I should inform you that I don't trust you."

"Oh, and why is that?"

"You betrayed HOMRA and your best friend. Why should I trust a traitor? Nobody likes traitors." She scoffed at him.

Fushimi scowled. "You shouldn't talk about thinks you don't understand."

Valentina sighed. Obviously realizing that it wasn't the best idea to anger him if she really wanted to talk to Munakata. "Whatever, just get me to Munakata-san. Please, it's really important!"

Fushimi rolled his eyes. "Fine, you can wait in his office. Follow me."

She smiled at him but it was a bit of a sad smile. "Thanks."

Fushimi wondered what had made her sad. And what had made her storm into Scepter 4? He couldn't understand that girl at all. And he didn't like that.

He led her to Munakata's office in silence where she sat down on one of the chair. He preferred to stand. She played absentmindedly with her hair. Fushimi noted that it was damp for some reason.

"Ne, Fushimi-san? Why did you leave HOMRA?" she asked after a while.

Fushimi shrugged. "That's none of your business."

"Yeah, I know. I'm just wondering. I heard you and Yata-kun were best friends once. Then why did you leave him behind?"

Fushimi clicked his tongue. It hadn't been him who'd left. Misaki had been who'd left him first. Misaki hadn't looked at him anymore. Leaving HOMRA had simply been his way to make Misaki look at him again. Hate or love. Really, where's the difference? Both of them are fueled by passion. And it was Misaki's passion he carved most.

"You know, I don't think he really hates you. He's very hurt but he doesn't hate you…yet." She continued. "You know how I knew how you drink your coffee? Yata-kun told me. He said: '_that stupid monkey never eats vegetables, unless you force them down his throat, and he drinks his coffee strong and black but with tons of sugar, it's disgusting! When he eats, he always first pokes the food with his tongue before he puts it in his mouth and he always sorts his food by shape, color, taste, whatever, before he starts eating. He is so weird_!' He actually kept talking like this for over an hour. Everyone in the cinema gave us angry looks."

Fushimi rolled his eyes. That idiot actually remembered these kinds of things be he never remembered his birthday? Still, he couldn't deny that he liked to hear that Misaki was still thinking about him. Still remembering those things.

After another ten minutes of waiting Fushimi decided to sit down. His legs were simply hurting too much. "What a waste of time." This really wasn't his day.

Valentina smiled at him. "Sorry that I bother you so much. Maybe I can make it up to you sometime."

"You could make it up by getting out of my life."

She chuckled. "Sorry, no can do. You're stuck with me."

"Can't you just tell me what kind of information you have?"

Valentina hesitated. "Well, you see I have this…"

That moment the door flew open and the captain of Scepter 4 marched inside. He froze when he saw them.

"Valentina?" he asked surprised.

Valentina frowned at him. "You know me?"

Munakata stared at her for another second before he chuckled and said. "Well, of course. I know everyone in Shizume City."

Fushimi watched his captain take a seat on his chair behind his office desk. What was that? Something was fishy here. Why did the captain know this girl?

"Now what brings you here?" Munakata asked.

Fushimi pointed with his thump at Valentina. "She says she has information for you."

The girl nodded and cast a quick glance at Fushimi.

"I'm not going to leave, if that's what you want." Fushimi replied to her glance.

Valentina sighed. "Fine. Well, I saw Munakata-san on TV, talking about that serial killer. And you showed that sketch of a raven…"

Munakata nodded. "Yes, the raven all the women had tattooed on their backs."

"Well, see for yourself." Valentina turned around and pulled her shirt over her head.

And there between her shoulder blades was the very same raven displayed as on the victims. Only that this tattoo was obviously older.

"I got it shortly after my sixteenth birthday…back in England." She explained.

Fushimi's eyes widened and he could hear a sharp intake of breath from Munakata. How was that possible? Fushimi exchanged looks with his captain and an unspoken message passed between them. _We need to talk! In privat!_

Fushimi nodded slightly and turned his attention back to the girl. "Do you have any idea what connection that killer could have to you?"

She didn't look at him, didn't say anything. She simply pulled her shirt back down and shook her head.

"I see… Fushimi, tell your men to transport Valentina's belongings to one of our empty rooms. She will from now on live here and you will personally look after her." Munakata declared.

"What?!" Fushimi gaped at his captain. Has he now completely lost his mind?

"Yes, I think that's the best choice. She might be in acute danger. I want you to look after her 24/7. She might even lead the killer right to us." Munakata explained.

"Wow wow wow, not so fast. I can take care of myself! I don't need a babysitter! I came here because I want informations about this killer, not to get a stalker." Valentina protested.

"Well, only Scepter 4 members are allowed to obtain closed information from our investigations. And it would be much safer for you to live here in the dormitories of Scepter 4. I want you to assist Fushimi-kun with the investigations. Of course you don't have to do it for free, you'll receive the average salary of a Scepter 4 officer. How does that sound?"

Valentina frowned at the captain but finally nodded. Fushimi wondered what she was thinking about. He remembered what he'd read on the Internet before and a shudder ran down his spin. Something was seriously off with that girl.

_Misaki…just who is that girl that you brought into your life…?_ He thought

He didn't like the fact that she was so close to his beloved Misaki, even less now that he knew that she was involved with a dangerous and crazy strain.

With a click of his tongue, Fushimi turned on his heel and stomped angrily out of the office. This was definitely the worst day ever. Only thinking about having to spend the next days or weeks with her… Why couldn't she just die or disappear? Fushimi was itching to just put his fingers around her neck and strangle her.

* * *

**Thanks for reading, I hope you enjoyed it^^ See you soon :D**


	6. Jewelery from England

**Hey guys :D To all of you who wonder what Fushimi found out about Valentina: the secret will be revealed in this chapter ;D**

**As always, thanks a lot for all your reviews and favs^^**

**To Exial: Yeah and I want to write more smut^^ but I also don't want to rush their relationship**

**To Deaths Lie: Thanks :) oh and don't worry, you're not sick. I know a punch of people who study medicine (and one of them also wants to become a pathologist) and I can only say: Crazy people. Crazy people everywhere.**

* * *

_Jewelery from England_

* * *

Valentina was nervously tapping her foot to the ground.

She wore the new uniform Munakata had prepared for her. The female uniform consisted normally of a surprisingly short mini-dress and a long-sleeved blue coat which split into four tails from the waist down. When she tried the original dress on, it had barely covered her butt. She liked her butt and she thought that she had a quite pretty butt, but she didn't feel like showing it off to her coworkers. Therefore she'd requested a longer dress. The dress she wore now was a basque-waist style and came down to her knees. She definitely liked it better, not least because it kind of looked like she wore a military lolita dress and she'd always liked the lolita fashion.

At the moment however, she was kind of nervous. She wanted to meet up with Yata to tell him the news and she knew that he wouldn't like it. He really hated Scepter 4 and she understood why. After all, he'd lost his best friend and his king to them. But she still hoped that he would somehow understand. She'd grown to like him and it would be a shame if she lost his friendship. She decided that she would resort to tears if nothing else helped. She knew that Yata would never turn his back on a crying girl.

She looked at the clock on her phone. He was late. She'd decided to meet him in the park near the place where they'd lain in the grass last time.

She waited a few more minutes until she saw him approaching on his skateboard.

Valentina took a deep breath and went to meet him. She saw how the smile slipped off his face when saw her.

"What's that supposed to mean?" he asked, eying her uniform.

"Yata-kun, I want to explain this to you. I've decided to join Scepter 4." She declared.

She saw the anger flare up in his eyes. "Are you fucking kidding me? After all I told you about those assholes? They can't be trusted!"

Valentina sighed. "I know. Please believe me. I didn't join them because I wanted to…"

He frowned worriedly. "Did they force you? If they're troubling you, then I swear I will…!"

Valentina shook her head. "No, they're not the problem. I went to Munakata-san because…Yata-kun…I think I'm in trouble…" her voice trailed off.

"What trouble?" he asked.

She turned away from him and started to walk. He followed her.

"I don't really want to talk about it… Munakata-san promised me he would take care of it." She answered.

Yata snored. "You can't trust that arrogant blue king! He's the one who killed Mikoto!"

Valentina gave him a faint smile. "I know. But it is his job to protect the civilians from Shizume City from dangerous strains. So, I hope he's doing his job well and protects me. He asked me to stay at Scepter 4 so he could better look after me."

"But he still let's you walk freely through the city?" Yata asked.

Valentina chuckled. "Not really, I ran away. Poor Fushimi-san is probably freaking out right now, I just hope he doesn't kill anyone. You know, Munakata-san assigned Fushimi-san to look after me. He totally hates it."

Yata gulped. "S-Saru?"

"Yeah…I think he really hates me. Must have hurt a lot when I kicked him." She said. "I thought about apologizing, but I don't think it will make much of a difference for him."

"Eh…yeah…anyway, if you have trouble with a strain, I could help you. I would totally kick his ass"! Yata proposed.

"I don't want to get you involved. And it's fine, really. It's my own mistake that it has come this far, I'll find a way to get out of it."

Yata frowned. "I still don't like it. If you're in trouble I want to help you. You know, some strains can get really dangerous."

"Yeah, I know. But it's fine really. I just wanted to explain to you why I joined Scepter 4. You don't hate me now, do you?" she asked innocently.

Yata shook his head. "Of course not. But I really don't trust those blue assholes."

Valentina shrugged. "Anyway, like I said I'm staying now at Scepter 4. That means my apparent is empty for the moment, feel free to use it if you want. It's still completely furnished. Where are you living anyway?"

* * *

Fushimi popped the small pill inside his mouth and gulped it down with water. It left a bitter taste in his mouth. Damn headache.

The serial killer case kept him busy day and night and Valentina wasn't helping at all. The girl was actually not quiet as annoyed as he'd imagined. She just always kept on disappearing. Fushimi didn't bother to look for her himself anymore, his subordinates could do that. And he felt better when she wasn't around, he just hoped that she wasn't with Misaki. Ah, his Misaki…he hadn't been able to see the boy since the case with the serial killer had started.

Fushimi leaned back on his office chair and closed his eyes. His head was pulsating with the dull ache and he hoped the pill would kick in soon.

Only thinking about Misaki immediately caused his heart to beat faster. Misaki always managed to send a rush of adrenalin through his body. Misaki was pure passion, heat, life force. He was just like the sun, shining hot and bright and giving life to everything around him. The fierce redhead had preoccupied all his thoughts ever since the day they'd first met. No being able to see the boy for a longer period of time stressed Fushimi a lot. At the moment he wanted to do nothing more than just ditch work just like Valentina. What was that girl thinking anyway? She'd been the one who wanted in on the case and the killer might even have some personal involvement with her, and what did she do? She spent a few hours with Fushimi and then ran away. Fushimi wondered why Munakata was even bothering with her.

Fushimi thought back to the conversation they had the day Munakata had invited the girl to Scepter 4. The captain had called him back to his office after the girl had left.

* * *

"_Do you know why I called you here?" Munakata asked._

"_Yes, the girl. Why did you invite her to join Scepter 4? There is something terribly off with her. I found an article about her…"_

"_Death?" Munakata interrupted him. "Yes, I know. I met her at Ashinaka High the day Mikoto died, she was found dead one day later. I attended the examination of her corpse. And I'm pretty sure it was her and not just someone who looked like her. You saw that faint scare on the bottom of her back when she lifted her T-shirt to show her tattoo? The Valentina who died back then had the same one."_

_Fushimi stared at Munakata in disbelieve. "You mean she's really dead? But how is that possible?"_

_Munakata shook his head. "I've no idea. I think that she was our killer's first victim… but she doesn't seem to remember anything of that time."_

_Fushimi frowned. "This is too absurd! One can't simply come back from the dead! That just impossible!"_

"_I know, I know… I'll try to get a hair of her to match her DNA to make sure it was really her. But I'm pretty sure it was. She even talks in exactly the same manner."_

_Fushimi shook his head. "It can't be her."_

"_I'm not saying that she's some kind of zombie. I'm just saying that I'm sure that she's the girl who died back then. I'm sure there is another explanation for her being alive now that doesn't include her rising from a grave. We just can't see it right now." Munakata said._

_Fushimi crossed his arms. "A what are we going to do now? Wouldn't it be better if we just lock her up?"_

_Munakata shook his head. "That wouldn't benefit us in any way. No, we better just observe her for the moment."_

* * *

No matter how long Fushimi taught about it…he couldn't come up with an answer. Valentina looked pretty much alive to him. She certainly didn't look like your average zombie. But reality was that she died all those months ago.

When Fushimi had first found the article about her death he'd taught that she'd faked her death or that she'd stolen the other girls identity or something like that. Not that she'd actually died. But Munakata had matched her DNA with the DNA of the Valentina who died back then. There were no doubts that it was the same girl.

So how did she do it? Fushimi once considered stabbing or strangling her – well, actually more than once – to see whether she would die or not. But Munakata wouldn't like that.

That was actually another thing that put Fushimi off. The captain seemed to handle the girl in a quite affectionate way. He even went out of his way to grant her wishes, like a different uniform or a room with balcony (he kicked one of his subordinates out of the room so she could have it). And Fushimi wasn't the only one who'd taken notice of this, some of their subordinates had already started gossiping.

"Just why is everyone crazy about that bitch?" he groaned to himself.

Somebody knocked on the door.

"What is it?" he called, not hiding the annoyance from his voice.

Awashima opened the door.

"We were able to identify another girl." She said and handed him a dossier.

"So how is the geographic profile going?" she asked.

Fushimi shook his head. "What do you think? We've only identified three girls – well, four now – and they all lived all over the city. I can't narrow it down to one specific area like this. I tried to find things they had in common but so far, I haven't found much."

Awashima nodded and looked at the clock on Fushimi's wall. "It's already past noon. You should take a break. How about lunch? I'm inviting you."

Fushimi shook his head. "No, but thanks. Maybe another time. I don't feel like eating now."

Awashima shrugged. "Do as you wish. See you later." She turned and left his office.

* * *

Blaise Lynwood became more and more irritated. First he found that article about Valentina, then he heard that she wasn't even visiting the language school he was paying for and now he stood inside her apartment and all her things were gone. He'd freaked out when he saw the article and when she didn't answer her phone, he'd jumped in the first flight to Japan.

"God Valentina! What are you doing to me?" he growled to himself.

How could he not find that article sooner? He hadn't had any contact with Valentina's parents after she'd simply disappeared two years ago but they could have at least informed him when her corpse had been found. Assholes. He'd never liked them and they'd never liked him. Still, when she showed up on his doorstep one month ago, he'd advised her to go and meet them. Back then he'd thought they were still thinking she'd run away. Now he understood why she'd refused. Back then she'd said that she wanted to go to Japan but that her parents would never let her and she'd promised him to call them as soon as she'd arrived there.

"Little lying bitch." He cursed under his breath as he turned to leave her apartment again.

He tried to call her again, but he simply got the message that her phone was turned off.

Blaise cursed himself for not realizing sooner what was going on. He'd thought nothing of it when she asked him to pay for her trip to Japan. She'd always been obsessed with Japan and he was only too happy to pay for her if it made her happy. He could afford it after all. But then he saw the news about that killer they called _The Raven_, because he tattooed his victims a raven on their back, and Blaise knew exactly from who Valentina had gotten that very same tattoo. She'd come here to find _him_.

Blaise looked up and down the street, not sure where he should look for her first. He only knew one thing: He had to find her. Fast.

* * *

Yata was rolling on his skateboard beside Valentina. She was happily munching some Yakitori.

"Fushimi-san is probably pissed when went I get back. Maybe I should buy him something to eat to clam his mood. He normally doesn't eat much over the day." She mused.

Yata rolled his eyes. "So that idiot still isn't eating properly? I don't understand him at all! In High School I was always afraid he would become anorexic or something, so I always forced him to eat."

"Wow, I don't understand people who don't like to eat. I love eating! I'm lucky I don't get fat easily, because I would never be able to pull a diet through." Valentina said.

"Well, he's a really picky eater but I know a place where you can get some bento he likes." Yata suggested.

Valentina finished her Yakitori and threw the stick away before she grinned at him and said "Thanks."

"A-and I'm doing this for you! Not for him! As far as I'm concerned that guy can starve himself to death!" Yata added.

Valentina chuckled. "Sure."

She suddenly stopped.

Yata stopped his skateboard and looked back at her. "What's the madder?"

A nervous smile appeared on her lips. "Oh nothing. I might just be a bit in trouble."

Yata followed her sight and saw a tall and dark haired man coming their way.

The man called something in English. Yata's school English had always been miserably and it had been quite some time since he had to use it. Therefore the only thing he understood were the words 'Valentina Calabrese'.

Valentina laughed and answered him in Japanese, probably because she saw the confused look on Yata's face. "Oh, hey Blaise… What a surprise! This is my friend Yata by the way. Yata-kun, this is Blaise…I think I've already told you about him."

Yata eyed the taller man. He was a foreigner – well, no surprise there – and seemed to be a bit older than Valentina. Probably already past his mid twenties. He had pitch-black hair that contrasted strongly with his blue eyes and pale skin. But his eyes were still not as striking as Valentina's. His clothes looked rather expensive and together with the many rings, the earrings and the necklace he wore, it made him look rather snobbish.

He gave Yata a short nod and turned back to Valentina. "I think you have some explaining to do…" he said, this time in Japanese too.

"Yeah…ehm, why don't move to a little less crowded place?" Valentina suggested.

"Do you want me to leave or stay?" Yata asked her. He didn't want to leave her alone with that guy, but she'd said that he was her friend and he also didn't want to bother her if she wanted to talk in private with him.

To his relieve she said. "Oh no, you can stay if you want."

Blaise frowned. It was obviously not the answer he'd hoped for.

They settled in the back of a rather empty café. After they'd ordered Blaise turned back to Valentina and said something in English. The girl rolled her eyes and answered.

Yata found it rather annoying that all he understood were fragments of their conversations. He thought back to his High School days when Saru had tried to help him with his English…to no avail. The damn monkey's English had always been flawless. Remembering those days hurt… He'd always looked up to Saru. Saru's life had always been perfect. Saru was smart and rich, he had had a wonderful and loving older brother and his mother was probably the most impressive woman Yata had ever seen. Back then, Yata had wished for nothing more than to be a part of that family… but Saru never seemed to understand the value of a family. First he'd thrown that family away and later their new family HOMRA too. Just what was wrong with that guy?

"Yata-kun? Is everything alright? You look kind of sad." Valentina poke his cheek and he turned his attention back to her.

He shook his head. "I'm fine. I was just a bit lost in thoughts. So what were you talking about?"

Valentina grinned at him. "Oh, right! Look at this!"

She held a necklace up to his eyes. It consisted of a thin silver chain and a small pendant.

She lowered her voice. "You know, Blaise is an magician! He can put spells on jewelery and then he sells them."

"Don't call me a magician, that sounds silly." Blaise protested. "But yeah, it's pretty profitable." he added.

Yata blinked at them. Magic? Spells? He never heard of something like that before. Could it be that that guy was a strain?

"So, what can this one do?" Valentina asked.

"That one comes in a pair. I'm currently wearing its counterpart." Blaise answered.

"Can I see it?"

Blaise hesitated for a moment before he took his necklace off and handed it to her. Valentina held both necklaces up in front of her face.

"The effect it triggered when two different people wear them at the same time." Blaise explained. "It makes you swap bodies with the other person."

"Swap bodies? How cool!" Valentina exclaimed and put the necklace around her neck. "So who should I swap bodies with?"

Blaise shook his head. "Don't play around with it, stupid."

Valentina stuck her tongue out at him.

Blaise rolled his eyes. "Fine, if you want to try it out do it with me."

Valentina seemed to consider that for a second but then she said "Nah" and before Yata realized what was happening she'd already thrown the necklace over his head.

The moment the pendant touched his chest his vision went black.

…

The next thing Yata felt was the cold floor against his cheek. Had he fainted? He sat up and long straight hair fell into his face. Wait…that was definitely not his hair!

He looked around and to his great shock he saw his body sitting up on the floor beside him. If his body was there… He suddenly remembered Blaise words and looked down on him only to be greeted by two nicely shaped boobs.

"Waaaaah!"

"Shut it idiot! The waiters will get suspicious." Blaise hissed at him before he turned to Yata's body. "Just what were you thinking, idiot?"

Yata watched how his body laughed and responded. "Wow, it really worked!"

Yata blinked. Was that really Valentina inside his body…and was he really inside her body?

Valentina got up from the floor and helped Yata to stand up. It was so unreal…seeing himself from outside.

Valentina blinked at him with Yata's hazel eyes. "Wow, I look even hotter from this point of view!"

Yata was still in shock. Slowly he raised his hand and touched his soft cheeks. Feeling the shape of his face.

"H-how…w-wha…" he stammered.

Valentina laughed. "Don't panic, Yata-kun. Blaise can of course reverse this any time. But isn't this cool?!"

Blaise sighed. "Yeah, I can reverse it…but not any time, idiot!"

Valentina blinked at him. "What's that supposed to mean?"

* * *

**So that's it for today^^ I hope you liked it. The next week is going to be pretty stressful for me (I need to pull some kind of magic stunt in order not to fail physics) so I'm not sure when I'll be able to update... but I'll try to update at least once a week or so. Well, see you soon^^**


	7. Pink Apricot

**So here I am again^^ First of all, many thanks Death Lie for betareading this chapter ;D And as always, many thanks for all your reviews and fav's!**

**I don't have much else to say, just enjoy reading^^**

* * *

_Pink Apricot*_

* * *

"That means, my dear, that I can't turn you back right away." Blaise said. "I haven't prepared the right spell yet. It might take one to two days, then I'll be able to turn you back."

Valentina's mouth dropped open. "One to two days? Are you fucking kidding me? Why didn't you say anything! I wouldn't have used it if I knew that!"

Blaise shrugged. "It wouldn't have been a big deal if you had done it with me. I'm more concerned about the poor boy you dragged into this." Blaise took a short look at Yata. "He looks like he's about to faint…"

Valentina swirled around to Yata and grabbed his hands. "Waaah, I'm so sorry! I thought it would only be for a few hours!"

Yata stared at her with big eyes. Not sure what to say. It was simply too weird to stare at himself.

Valentina's eyes widened as she realized something. "Oh my god, how are we going to do it? I have to go back to Scepter 4, or they will come looking for me!"

Blaise frowned. "What's Scepter 4?"

"Long story short,I'm now working for them. And I have to go back there before it gets dark. I'm sure Fushimi-san just lets it pass when I run away from time to time because he simply can't be bothered with me but he certainly won't let me spend a whole day or two away."

Yata's eyes went wide when he understood what she meant. "I am not going there!"

"You have to! I can't go back there with your body!" Valentina pleaded.

Yata wildly shook his head, making his now unusually long hair flying in his face. He angrily pushed it away. "No way! No! No! No! I cannot put up being in the same room as that damn monkey! Much less inside a building filled with those fucking blue coats!"

Valentina put her hands on her hips in a very girlish manner, making it look completely ridiculous. "Oh, and what would you suggest? Me putting a dress on and acting like nothing happened?" She asked sarcastically.

Yata gaped at her. Would she really do that? She was certainly shameless enough. Like hell he'd ever live that down! "You can't do that!" He squeaked at her.

"Now, now. Could you two calm down?" Blaise asked, but went completely ignored.

"It would only be for the night. You show up, ignore some stupid comments from Fushimi-san, go to sleep and disappear again first thing the next day. That won't kill you." Valentina pleaded.

"No, but I might kill other people." Yata said.

Valentina rolled her eyes. "Fine! Either you go there or I go there. And believe me, if you make me go there you will regret it!"

Yata paled. Did she really just threaten him? He couldn't believe it! He was actually being threatened by a girl!

"I-I . . ." Misaki stuttered, not knowing what he should say. He didn't want to face that damn monkey. On the other hand, it would cause trouble for Valentina and she would cause trouble for him. Well, what a shitty situation altogether.

Yata sighed. "Fine, I'll do it."

* * *

Yata felt extremely weird when he walked up to the building that was Scepter 4's headquarters. He held two bentos in his arms. One was for himself, since he hadn't eaten anything yet, and the other one was for Saruhiko.

"Welcome back, Valentina-san!" Called one of the guards. "What have you got there?"

Yata forced a smile on his lips and tried to speak like Valentina. He even remembered to use _atashi_ instead of _ore_*. "Just dinner. I hope to placate Fushimi-san with it."

The guard laughed. "Good luck with that! If he annoys you too much, just scream and I will come to your rescue."

_'__As if I would need your help, dumbass!'_ Yata thought. He tried to imitate Valentina's laugh and just said "Thanks" before he walked on. He wasn't even inside the building yet and he already had the urge to smash somebody's head.

Once he was inside, he asked someone where he could find Saruhiko. He was directed to the main control room.

Yata felt his heart beating faster as he walked trough the long and empty corridors of Scepter 4's headquarters. He was kind of nervous. He wasn't sure he could pull off acting like Valentina. Especially in front of Saruhiko. That guy had been his best friend for years after all. Yata really didn't understand how he had been able to hang around with that guy for all thoseyears. Now, just hearing his stupid laugh was enough to piss him off. He really had to pull himself together, and fast.

The main control room was filled to the brim with blue coats, and all of them had their eyes on one person; Saruhiko Fushimi. The Monkey was pointing something out on a map as Yata entered the room.

"…and the last victim we were able to identify lived here." He pointed at a red dot on the map.

"We currently assume that he seduces his victims and makes them come with him freely. We don't know where he finds them or where he takes them afterwards. The building where we found the victims was only the place where he dropped their corpses off when he was finished, he didn't torture them there…" Saruhiko continued.

Yata started to feel queasy when he looked around the room. Somebody had put up boards on which hung the pictures of dead women. There were around twenty of them, on four of them stood names. What was going on here?

"… the sperm we found on the victims always belonged to the same person, but we can't match the DNA. I think we should order a mass DNA test* to find the killer. Awashima-san is, at this very moment, trying to get the authorization for it, it's only a matter of time." Saruhiko said. "Have you interrogated the neighbors around the house, where we found the victims?"

One of the blues stood up from his chair. "Yes, they all claim not to have seen anything suspicious. They also all claim to have seen the owner of the house regularly, even during the last few weeks. When we told them that the owner was among victims and died months ago, they wouldn't believe us."

Saruhiko frowned but nodded. The man who'd spoken sat down again.

It went on like this for a while and Yata became more and more shocked. Eventually, most of the Scepter 4 officers left the room. The ones who didn't leave, started to work on the computers.

Saruhiko finally noticed Yata. He rolled his eyes and walked over to him.

"Where the hell have you been all day?! The captain will rip my head off if he finds out that I let you run off!" Saruhiko hissed at him.

Yata scowled. "Well, in that case you can tell him that I'm not your fucking prisoner and that I can go where ever the fuck I want!"

He tried not to raise his voice too much. Only looking at that damn monkey already made him angry. He tried to calm himself knowing that Valentina probably wouldn't pitch a fit at something like this.

"Anyway, I bought you dinner. Are you hungry?" he said.

"No" Saruhiko said and walked past him.

"No?!" Yata followed Saruhiko out of the room. "What's that supposed to mean? I went out of my way to buy this, so you're going to fucking eat it! I bet you haven't eaten anything all day! I swear, on day you're going to die from malnutrition!"

Saruhiko didn't bother to look back at him while Yata hurried to keep up.

"Did you spend the day with Misaki? You're starting to sound like him…" Saruhiko said.

Yata bit his lip. Dammit! He needed to get his temper under control, otherwise Saruhiko would find out that he wasn't Valentina. That damn monkey was certainly smart enough.

Yata snorted. "I think you're overworking yourself, because you're staring to imagine things."

Saruhiko didn't answer to that, so they walked the rest of the way in silence. A young woman wearing the Scepter 4's female uniform leaned against the door to Saruhiko's office when they arrived.

She was pretty, a little smaller than Valentina and more fragile looking. The most outstanding thing about her was her striking pink hair, which she'd pulled back into a loose ponytail.

She smiled at Saruhiko as soon as she saw them. "There you are! I've got what you asked for." She waved with the dossier she held in her hand.

Saruhiko took the dossier with a simple "Thanks" from her and tucked it under his arm without looking at it.

The pink-haired woman chuckled and said, "No problem."

She turned to Yata. "Oh, I think we haven't met yet. My name is Oguri Anzu, I work in Scepter 4's science department. It's nice to meet you."

Yata forced a smile on his lips and bowed. "My name is Calabrese Valentina, it's nice to meet you Oguri-san."

"Well, I have to get back to work. That killer sure is keeping us busy. See you later, Saruhiko." She said cheerfully before she turned to walk away.

"Yeah. Bye." Saruhiko answered dully.

Yata dug his fingernails into his palm and followed Saruhiko inside his office.

'_Saruhiko? Did she just say Saruhiko?! And the Monkey didn't seem like he minded it! Who that hell is that woman? And how come she was fucking allowed to call Saru by his first name? And without any honorifics?! That meant she had to be rather close to him!_' Yata thought. Except Saruhiko's mother and himself, Yata had never heard anyone call Saruhiko without any honorifics.

Yata really wanted to start screaming at Saruhiko and make him explain who the hell that woman was. That would appear really weird however, so he bit his tongue and put Saruhiko's bento on his desk, in a rather forceful way.

Saruhiko raised his eyebrow.

"Eat that." Yata snarled at him. "I'm going to my room."

"Are you angry?" Saruhiko asked. "Because if anyone in this room has a reason to be angry it would be me! Since the first time I met you, you're causing be nothing but trouble. And I swear to you, the only reason I didn't already hand you out to that killer on a fucking silver platter wrapped in a ribbon with a bow on top of your head is because it would cost me my job. So you better not fucking start giving me that kind of attitude, or I might start thinking that my job really isn't worth it."

Yata's mouth dropped open. He couldn't remember Saruhiko ever talking to him with such hatred. Not even when he announced that he would leave HOMRA!

Yata didn't know how to answer to that so he simply turned around to leave. The moment he grabbed the doorhandle he stopped however, Misaki paused before he asked, "…Where is my room again?"

Saruhiko rolled his eyes. "Are you dumb? It's room number 1228. How can you forget that?"

"Ah, I remember now!" Yata said hastily before he hurried out of the room.

* * *

"So what are we going to do now?" Valentina asked. She was walking down the street beside Blaise, carrying Yata's skateboard under her arm because she had no idea how to ride it.

Blaise shrugged. "Well, either we go to your place, or rather my place, since I'm the one paying for it, and I start with the spells, or…" He held his credit card up and grinned at her. "We buy our dear Yata some new clothes and then we go check out the clubs in this city."

Valentina grinned at him. "I'm definitely voting for the last one! It's been too long since I've really been drunk!"

* * *

**So, I hope you liked this chapter^^ Here are a few explanations in case anyone's interested.**

*** Anzu's name means Apricot in Japanese, that's where I got the title from.**

*** _Atashi_ and ore are both Japanese pronouns. _Atashi_ is an informal but very feminine version of _watashi_, used by women in casual contexts. If a male character uses _atashi_ it is almost certainly meant to be comical, or perhaps creepy. _Ore_ means as much as "I, a tough young person". Although it is unisex, it is used mainly by young men (from adolescence to around middle age, usually) in casual contexts, such as hanging out with friends. As such, it's traditionally considered rude to use it with strangers and people above one's own social standing, but nowadays younger men use it even with strangers in all but formal situations. Used by a vast majority of male leads in anime, especially in shounen, and also occasionally by extremely tough and aggressive women, mainly in fiction.**

*** A mass DNA test is sometimes used if DNA samples were found on a crime scene, which couldn't be matched, in order to find the offender. The police then takes a large number of DNA samples of a part of the population (normally only the male population) in a specific area, this is also often combined with an interrogation. Examples of such mass DNA test's were the DNA test in Wee Waa (Australia) where 600 men were tested in order to find the rapist of a 93 year old woman or the test in a small town Massachusetts where they tested 790 men in order to find the murderer of Christa Worthington. One of the largest largest mass DNA tests up to date was the test in Dresden (Germany) and its environs where over 100.000 men were tested to find a man who'd sexually abused two girls. The police was able to arrest the child abuser two years later thanks to the tests.**


	8. Underwater Cupcakes

**Hey hey, I'm back with a new chapter ;)**

**First of all my acknowledgements, just like always^^:**

**Thanks to Deaths Lie for taking the time to beta read this and thanks for every review (especially to those who review regularly)**

**I hope you're going to enjoy this chapter^^**

* * *

_Underwater Cupcakes_

* * *

Yata slammed the door to Valentina's room shut behind him. He felt like screaming, and kicking. Or at least skateboarding. Skateboarding always helped to calm him down. He stomped over to Valentina's bed, took her pillow and threw it against the wall.

"Damn that monkey!"

He threw himself on the bed and buried his face in the blanket. He felt miserable. Seeing Saruhiko today. Seeing the place he lived in. It had made him realize just how well Saruhiko was doing. He was successful and he was even leading the investigation against a serial killer. The pink-haired woman was probably his girlfriend. She was really pretty.

Saruhiko didn't need Yata or HOMRA, in fact, he was doing much better without them. Without Mikoto, HOMRA was on the verge of falling apart anyway.

Now that he thought back, Yata realized that Saruhiko had always been better off without him. Saruhiko's life had always been perfect. It had always been Yata who'd depended on him, who dragged him down.

Yata thought about how Saruhiko had just talked to him. It bothered him more than he liked to admit. The way he'd looked at Yata had been the worst thing about it. His eyes seemed to say _Just die already_. Saruhiko had attacked him before. He often liked to provoke Yata. To mock him and everything he cared about. Yata was used to that. But Saruhiko had never ever looked at him like that. He knew that his words, and looks, were directed at Valentina, but they'd still felt like punches in his face.

Yata sat up on the bed and took a few deep breaths. He was trying to fight back his tears. He'd always been someone to cry easily and he'd always hated that about him. He was so pathetic.

He stood up from the bed and looked down at himself. He probably should get out of that uniform if he didn't want to wrinkle it up too much. That meant he would see Valentina's body. He immediately felt himself blush at the thought. On the other hand, he couldn't run around in that uniform for days.

He hesitated for a bit, but then decided that it was better to get just over with it. His hands were shaking a bit when he opened the buttons. He'd never seen a woman naked. Well, except his stepsister, he'd bathed her a few times when she'd still been in kindergarten, but that hardly counted. Despite being utterly embarrassed, he was also kind of curious. He stripped down to Valentina's underwear and neatly folded everything. He walked to the bathroom and looked at himself, or rather Valentina, in the mirror.

She had a nice body, well trained and her breasts were probably a good C-cup.

Yata put his hand over the breaths and squeezed them slightly. They felt really soft and nice. Maybe women weren't so bad after all. His embarrassment was slowly declining but he knew that he would have trouble facing Valentina later.

Yata glanced at the bathtub in the room. A hot bath would be nice now, but that meant he needed to get completely naked. He hesitated for a moment, but then walked over to the tub and turned the water on. It wouldn't kill him to see a woman's naked body. Hopefully. But since he didn't want to look too much at Valentina's girl body, he decided that it might be better to take a bubble bath. He rummaged thought her cupboards and found in one of them a whole lot of bath fizzies and different colored bottles of bubble baths.

Yata frowned, he had no idea what to use. He almost never took baths, his room back at HOMRA only had a shower. The fizzies all had funny shapes, some of them looked so much like real cupcakes that he wondered whether they were eatable or not. He grabbed a handful of these fake cupcakes and threw them into the water. He also added a quarter of the content of a blue bottle. Just to make sure.

While Yata waited for the tub to fill itself he started to fumble with Valentina's bra. He had some trouble with the turned his back towards the mirror to get a better look, and nearly got a heart attack. Not because of Valentina's body, but because of the tattoo. The tattoo of a raven with wide spread wings. He'd seen that tattoo before. In Scepter 4's main control room. Hanging on multiple boards. And the women with very same the tattoo had all been dead. Killed by the serial killer.

"Valentina…"

Yata suddenly remembered her words.

_"I went to Munakata-san because… Yata-kun… I think I'm in trouble…"_

_"I don't really want to talk about it…"_

_"I don't want to get you involved. And it's fine, really. It's my own mistake that it has come this far, I'll find a way to get out of it."_

Yata gulped. She went to Scepter 4 because she was running from that serial killer? And Saru had to look after her because he was currently looking for that very same serial killer.

"God…Valentina. How could you say it's fine? This isn't fine at all! THIS ISN'T EVEN CLOSE TO FINE!" he started to scream. And he wasn't sure if he was screaming at himself or at her picture in the mirror.

_'How can she take something like this so lightly?! Her fucking life is in danger.'_ he thought angrily.

Yata thought about seeing her picture among the ones in the main control room and felt sick. He finally managed to open the damn clasp and threw the stupid thing angrily against the wall. He walked out of the bathroom, grabbed his phone and tried called her. She didn't pick up.

"AH FUCK THIS SHIT!" he screamed and threw the phone away.

Yata walked up and down in the room. He didn't know what he should do.

'_Why isn't she answering her phone?_' He was worried. More than worried. '_Is it possible that the killer already got her?_'

Yata shook his head. _'No, she is in my body. The killer only targets women. She should be safe. But..._' he frowned. '_doesn't that mean I am currently the killer's target?_'

He took a deep breath. "Okay, now calm down, calm down." He said to himself.

He had really no need to worry. Valentina should be safe and he was inside of Scepter 4, which was probably the safest place in this city. _'It's not like the killer can just walk in here.'_

Wait a minute. "And even if he could get in here, I would just kick that bitch's ass! I'm not afraid of anyone!" he said loudly, meanly to convince himself.

Yata knew he was strong. No normal human could do shit to him. A strain on the other hand was a whole different matter.

He suddenly remembered the tub and walked back into the bathroom to turn it off. It smelled really amazing, and the foam was already floating thickly to the edges of the tub. He quickly took Valentina's panties off without looking down and climbed into the tub. The water was really hot, but he liked closed his eyes and tried to relax. _'Man, this is really one hell of a day.'_ Not only did he switch unwillingly bodies with his only female friend (except Anna, but Anna was still a child and therefore didn't count as female) but also found out that some bloody fucking crazy killer was hunting said female friend. At least, now he knew what was really going on.

Strains could become, depending on their powers, really dangerous. Especially the crazy ones. He thought of the women in the pictures that hung in the control room. Yata hated violence against women. He hated seeing women cry. It remembered him too much of his home before he escaped to HOMRA.

Yata opened his eyes and smirked. _'I don't care how strong that strain is, I'm going to kill him. He'll regret ever laying his hands on a woman!'_

He raised his right hand out of the water and looked at it. Valentina had small hands with long thin fingers. Her pale skin had already started to shrivel from the water. Yata tried to spark a flame on his palm but nothing happened.

He sighed. "Looks like I can't use my Aura inside this body. What a bother!"

Valentina's body was quite well trained, she was probably stronger than most other women, but she was still a woman. Without his Aura, it made Yata feel rather helpless. He hated feeling helpless. _'I hope that Blaise guy turns us back to normal soon!'_

He tried to push the thoughts away. All he could do now was to wait for tomorrow. As soon as he was back to normal, he would go back to HOMRA and ask Anna for help. Since she was a strain herself, she should be able to give him some information about how to deal with a strain. Maybe she was even able to track the killer down. Well, if she talked to him at all. She hadn't talked since Mikoto's death but hopefully she would understand the urgency of the situation.

"Just think of something else now…" he said to himself and closed his eyes again.

He cupped Valentina's breasts with his hands again and smirked. He had to admit that he really liked how they felt in his hands. Maybe having a girlfriend wouldn't be so bad after all. He certainly liked how soft and delicate their bodies felt. He wondered whether Saruhiko had ever held a girl's breasts like this.

Probably yes.

He was so good-looking, he shouldn't have any trouble getting a girl. On the other hand, Yata had never seen him with a girl before. The pink-haired girl came back to his thoughts. Well, except her. Yata could imagine her with Saruhiko. He could imagine Saruhiko lying on top of her, kissing her.

Yata bit his lip. A nice tingling feeling ran through his body.

He let his hands wander a bit down on Valentina's body. Her waist was much slimmer than his. He liked to let his hands up and down his body and imagined them to be Saruhiko's. The way he knew Saruhiko, he probably wouldn't be very gentle with his girls. He would bite her, bruise her, but it would just feel sooo good!

Yata felt his skin heating up and a pleasant feeling spread between his legs. He slowly let his right hand wander lower, hesitating a bit before breaking that last taboo. A moan escaped his lips when his fingers stroke a certain point between his legs. He closed his eyes and leaned his head back as he repeated the movement. God, that felt really good.

The memories of that dream a few days ago came involuntarily back to him.

Yata unconsciously spread his legs wider and bucked his hips upwards.

Saru's soft smile, his flushed cheeks and hungry eyes.

A tremor ran through his body as Yata moaned softly "S-Saru…"

Yata tore his eyes open. "What the hell am I doing?"

He immediately jumped out of the tub and wrapped his body in a towel. His problem was not that he'd masturbate. For god's sake, he was a guy! Of course he'd masturbated before. His problem was more that he'd masturbated to his ex-best friend in the body of his only female friend. That was just weird!

Yata massaged his temples. "Man, I really need to calm down."

The pleasant feeling was still lingering between his legs, begging for a touch and release.

He shook his head and tugged the plug out of the tub. Yata waited until it was empty again before he stepped into the tub again, took the shower head and turned the water on ice cold. He didn't know whether cold water worked on girls the same way as on boys but he figures that it had to be a turn off no matter what gender you were.

* * *

Yurina stepped silently into the dark room. It hadn't been very hard to slip past the blue clansmen with the help of her Aura. The green Aura had, to her displeasure, only defensive abilities. Yurina was able to conceal herself from enemies and to predict their moves a few seconds in the future. Her brother had on top of that also the ability to heal. Those things could be useful but in a direct fight against another Aura they had absolutely no chance. Therefore they had to beat their enemies with their brains instead of their brawn.

Yurina close the door quietly behind her and let some green flames dance on her fingers to give her some light. What a foolish girl, she didn't even lock her room. From the documents, she'd found in the other blue clansmen's rooms, she knew that this girl had some close connection to that serial killer.

"You think you're safe here? Well, you're not. Look at how easily I got in." she whispered silently to herself.

The girl in the bed snored peacefully. Her ash blond hair was a mess around her head. She wore a T-shirt, that was her way too big, it probably once belonged to some boy, and some dark shorts.

Yurina clicked her tongue and turned away from the girl to look for some information about the killer. She'd just started the girl's laptop when she felt her phone vibrating.

"Moshi moshi." She said quietly as she picked it up.

"_Yurina-nee-san, have you found anything yet? I've watched over those HOMRA guys for days now and nothing happened. But their clan is really a wreck. They're fighting all the time. This is starting to get really annoying!_" She heard her twin brother's voice on the other end of the line.

"Masaru." She said and smiled. "Yeah, I think I might be on to something. But I'm not sure yet, I'm still looking in to it. I'll tell you about it tomorrow."

_"Good, see you tomorrow at noon. Bye nee-san*."_

"Bye Masaru."

She hung up and put the phone away. She chuckled soundlessly. If her brother knew where she was right now he'd freak out.

She turned her attention back to the laptop. It needed a password. Yurina frowned and took a look around the room. What could she have used as password?

Many people used either very simple passwords or wrote them down somewhere. This girl had many books in her room. Some older and some newer, most of them in languages Yurina didn't know. This girl seemed to like reading. Yurina picked up some of the books that looked the most used and looked through them. She eventually found a folded page-corner in a book with the title _La Princesse de Clèves_. A sentence was underlined on that page.

Yurina frowned at the sentence. She had no idea whether it had any connections with the girl's password**,** but she decided to try it out. She used all the first letters of that sentence and pushed Enter.

_Password incorrect._

Yurina tilted her head and tried it again, but this time she omitted all the mes, je, ce, et, que and whatever.

_Password incorrect._

"Okay, one last time..."

She replaced the a's with 's.

This time the girl's desktop picture appeared. Yurina grinned at the screen and whispered quietly, "Well, hello!"

* * *

It was around 4 in the morning went Fushimi awoke from his sleep. He sat up on his bed and adjusted his glasses. He'd fallen asleep while still wearing his complete Scepter 4 uniform. Maybe Valentina was right and he was really overworking himself. After all he hadn't seen his Misaki in days. Maybe he was on withdrawal. Now he started to hear his voice already…

Fushimi started up. No, he was really hearing Misaki's voice, he wasn't just imagining it! It was what had awoken him. _'What the hell is Misaki doing here?'_

Fushimi stood up from his bed and walked over to the door. The voices became clearer now. One belonged to Misaki, the other one to Valentina.

Fushimi immediately felt hot anger searing through his body. '_What on earth is Misaki doing with that bitch in the middle of the night? I'm going to fucking strangle her if she did anything to my Misaki!'_

He unlocked the door and tore it open. "What the hell is going on here?"

The scene took place before him was a bit different from what he'd expected.

There was Misaki, laughing and rolling in the floor. In tight black pants, a burgundy red dress shirt and dress shoes that looked like they cost more money than Misaki earned in a whole year. Valentina on the other hand was barefoot and only wore a baggy T-shirt and some shorts. Her hair was a complete mess. She was currently trying to get Misaki to stand up and startled when she heard Fushimi's voice.

She opened her mouth to say something but Misaki was faster. He jumped up and tackled Fushimi with a happy, "Fushimi-san! Lets dance!"

Fushimi smelled the alcohol the moment Misaki came closer. He was obviously drunk. And since when was he calling him Fushimi-san? Misaki had never ever before called him by his last name. But Fushimi didn't wonder about it very long because the moment Misaki's body touched his, his mind went black and his heart went overdrive. He'd always loved the feeling of how perfect Misaki's body fit against his and it'd been quite a while since he'd been able to be this close to Misaki.

"Waaa! The hell are you doing, idiot!" he heard Valentina scream.

Misaki just laughed and tried to pull Fushimi into a twirl by his wrists. "_'To mourn a mischief that is past and gone is the next way to draw new mischief on'_" he called out in perfect English.

Fushimi stilled and turned to Valentina, who looked at Misaki in complete confusion. "Well, would you like to explain to me when Misaki learned perfect English? Or started quoting Shakespeare, for that matter?"

* * *

**Thanks for reading, I hope you liked it :D**

**In case anyone is not so familiar with the Japanese sibling terminology:**

*** O-nee-san/nee-san is the term used to address your older sister in Japanese, O-nii-san/nii-san on the other hand is the term to address your older brother (these are the most basic ones, there are of course many variations due to regional differences in pronunciation and from slang usages). The honorifics -san or even -sama are frequently used for respected older siblings, -chan is more affectionate. The prefix O- indicates even further respect. These are only used to address older siblings, younger siblings are simply addressed by their first name. I like using the Japanese sibling, or generally family, terminology because it gives a lot of information about the relationships between the family members.**


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